


Worlds Enough

by DangerousCommieSubversive



Series: Our Bright, Disturbing Multiverse [6]
Category: Batman (Comics), DCU, Green Arrow, Justice League, Marvel (Movies), Marvel Avengers Movies Universe, Secret Six, Superman (Comics), Teen Titans, Witchblade, Wonder Woman (Comics), Young Avengers
Genre: Auctions, Awesome, Crossover, Fanboys - Freeform, Fear, Gen, Interdimensional Travel, Parallel Universes, Prayer, Rescue, and then there will be teamups, battles, boom tubes, crossover events, eventually shit's gonna get real, hostages, mother box, poor planning and bad decision making, seriously bad decisions are made, teen heroes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-31
Updated: 2012-11-27
Packaged: 2017-11-17 11:41:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 33,675
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/551164
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DangerousCommieSubversive/pseuds/DangerousCommieSubversive
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Seventeen years after an attempted supervillain invasion of San Diego Comic Con, an anxious fanboy finds himself sucked into another, far scarier comic-book world. With nobody to turn to, he finds himself in the hands of his favorite characters--and they're supervillains. Which begs the question: what would <i>your</i> favorite bad guy do if he had the chance to grill you about his nemesis?</p><p>Features fun with boom tubes, fear with Batman villains, and eventually a big Avengers/Justice League team-up! You know you want this.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Boom

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi, everyone, and welcome to the latest installment of Our Bright, Disturbing Multiverse, in which we get even more multiversal! For those of you new to the series, I suggest you back up and read the earlier ones first--they're quick reads, and contain vital background info.
> 
> For those of you who've been reading all along: hey, check it out, it's Merlin!

_Tap tap tap click click click flash flash flash._

“We'd love to talk to you about your Olympic triumph—”

“Is it true that you're aiming to follow in your mother's footsteps and take up acting?”

“Mr. Baker!”

“Mr. Baker!”

Merlin pulled up his hood and ran.

It seemed like right now his life was just interview upon interview. He'd been interviewed before the Olympics. He'd been interviewed during the Olympics. Now he was getting interviews after the Olympics, and the photographers were worse without the constant company of other Olympians. Normally he liked talking to people—the _Teen Beat_ interview had been particularly fun—but it had been a week of nonstop running around to television studios and radio stations. World's sexiest Olympic archer he might be, but a creature of boundless energy he was certainly _not._

Luckily most papparazzi didn't run very fast, and he was in decent shape, so he managed to get out of their line of sight fairly quickly and ducked into a small local grocery. He was still fairly conspicuous, given that he'd brought his bow and arrows along to the TV station for an archery demo, but if he could get through this store to their back door he'd be golden. Plus, as a bonus, he could get something to eat—it felt like it had been ages since he'd had lunch.

He stepped into the snacks aisle and began browsing through the chips and pretzels, all the while trying to look completely casual and not like a popular local athelete. With his hood up people probably wouldn't notice his hair, which was a fairly distinctive shade of red, and as long as he kept his quiver shut it'd just look like a weird backpack.

In his pocket something buzzed—probably one of his moms wanting to know where to pick him up from his interview. He reached for his phone and then realized that it wasn't what was buzzing. Wrong pocket. The phone was on his _left_ side. The _right_ -hand pocket was for...his dimensional rift detector.

 _Ok, a visit from Dad would totally make life better right now._ He dug out the rift detector and checked the readout.

 _Dimensional rift appearing in 4:57._ The seconds ticked down. Just enough time for him to buy something. He grabbed a Mounds bar, paid quickly, and followed the indicator on the rift detector to the back door of the grocery store, which was happily where he'd wanted to go anyway.

The back door of the store opened onto a side street, not well-lit in the fading day but fairly clean and full of little stores that had already closed for the evening. Merlin stepped out, closing the door gently behind him, and pulled off his hood. “Dad?”

His dad wasn't around. He frowned and glanced around the street. There weren't any of the normal signs of a dimensional crossing evident—normally the gate that Dr. Richards had built anchored itself onto whatever wall was nearest and looked like a glowing doorway. Nor were there any signs of an explosion, which was how his dad had first gotten here and met his moms. The detector's red light was shining, though, and he knew that if he had the sound on it would have been shrieking his eardrums apart.

After a minute of confused staring he finally saw it. The rift wasn't a gate or anything explosive; instead, there was a circular _rip_ in the air, as if someone had slashed through the fabric of the world with a blunt knife. Merlin couldn't see what was on the other side of it, and nobody was coming through.

Nobody else was there, either. He stared at the rip, eyes widening as he realized that he finally, _finally_ had the opportunity to get a look at another world—every other time he'd been near a rift it had been with his moms, and they never let him go through. They said it was too dangerous.

Cautiously he approached the rip in the air, one hand out to touch it or in case anyone fell through and needed catching. “Hey, Dad, you there?”

No answer.

He moved closer, and closer. Nobody was coming through, but faintly through the rip he could see an evening city—probably New York City, he thought, that was where his dad normally traveled from.

He reached out to touch the rip. “Da—”

_BOOM._

 

\--

 

When Merlin came to he found that he was standing on a city street, and it was getting fairly dark—he'd apparently been out, or in transit or something, for at least half an hour. There wasn't really anyone out and about; all the shop fronts were shuttered and locked tightly, and the few pedestrians walked quickly and didn't meet his eyes.

 _Definitely_ New York, then.

His clothes were still intact, though. He had his wallet with his ID and his dimensional rift detector in his right-hand pocket, cell phone and collapsed iTab in his left, and his quiver and bow on his back. Nobody being around to greet him wasn't even an emergency. If he had to, he could follow the advice Also-Mom had always given him. “If you _do_ wind up on your dad's side of things,” she'd told him, “look for the nearest Stark Industries office—call one if you have to. Tell them that you're Agent Barton's son and that it's an emergency. If nothing else SHIELD will come and pick you up; they monitor phone calls all the time. Don't call your uncle unless there's really nothing else you can do.”

There wasn't even an all-night convenience store nearby, and the nearest Stark Industries office was probably closed, but it couldn't hurt to try. Merlin pulled the wrapper off his Mounds, popped one in his mouth, and started heading down the street.

The streets remained deserted as he walked, but the city was full of strange noises, and even with the miniscule blood sugar boost provided by the candy it was hard to stay calm. He'd never really been in a city by himself at night—normally he was with his coach, or his moms, or other teenagers or athletes. Never alone. Every dark street seemed to be full of menace, the cars that drove by were all dark and suspicious, and he didn't know where he was. Actually, fuck staying calm, it was hard not to _panic._ He pulled his bow out of its quiver-side sling and hit the button that opened it up to full size. He might not have been his dad, but if he had to, he could defend himself.

A motorcycle roared down a street nearby, turned toward him, and then screeched to a stop next to Merlin. On impulse he reached for the quiver on his back. _Oh god it's a mugger I'm going to get beaten up Mom and Also-Mom would be so disappointed if they found out that I got robbed because I was_ stupid _enough to go into an alternate dimension..._

A high, aristocratic voice said, “You ought to put that bow down before someone gets hurt. Probably you.”

Merlin didn't lower his bow. Dad had always told him to never let the enemy have the advantage. “I know what I'm doing.”

“I should hope so. That's a very high-quality bow for an amateur. Anyway we heard your boom tube; are you meant to be Merlyn the Magnificent's son or something? I didn't think he had any children, but you're wearing an awful lot of purple.”

“Well, uh, my name's Merlin. Purple's my favorite color.” Merlin turned to get a good look at whoever had accosted him. “Did you just say boom tube?”

“What else would I have said? That's what you were using.” The speaker was a boy a few years younger than him, dressed in a costume of red and green and yellow. He was perched on a pitch-black motorcycle, and in one hand he held a short black baton. He sneered at Merlin from beneath a green domino mask. “And in any case you wouldn't be the only one. Practically a plague of them recently. Come on, then, who are you?”

Merlin stared. “Oh my god you're Damian Wayne.”

“Excuse me?”

It was all too much. He hadn't eaten real food in hours, he was tired, and this was way more than he'd prepared to deal with. “I'm such a big fan.”

Then he fainted.

 

\--

 

When he woke up he was lying on the sidewalk, and there were two dark figures looming over him. They were speaking in hushed tones. One of them had his bow.

“—ther—Batman, I mean—he knew my _name._ And he seemed _very_ confused, although he might have just been sick, he _did_ faint.”

“What did he say his name was?”

“He said it was Merlin. And that purple was his favorite color. He doesn't look at _all_ like Merlyn the Magnificent. Maybe he's adopted?”

“Possible. Unlikely. Might be a spy.” The taller speaker turned Merlin's bow in his hand. “This bow is unusual. Looks like military issue.” He hit the button that collapsed the bow and hung it on his belt. “He's coming to.”

Merlin sat up slowly, rubbing the back of his head. “ _Ow._ 'm not adopted. Not related to Merlyn the Magnificent at _all,_ I'm way better-looking than he is. Oh...” The world spun around him.

The taller figure crouched in front of him and held something out—a protein bar. “Eat this before you faint again.”

“Thanks.” He took the protein bar and ate it at a speed that was probably inadvisable, feeling the compacted rice and fake-chocolate coating settle into a knot in his stomach. The dark man remained crouched in front of him, and once he'd finished eating he tried to get a better look at his benefactor and his eyes went wide. The man in front of him wore a massive cape, and his face was hidden by a dark cowl. The set of his jaw was firm, but not cruel, and a familiar symbol was stamped in yellow and black on the chest of his costume. “You're...you're Batman.”

“Yes. Who are you, and where did you get access to a boom tube?”

“I am _so_ lost. This isn't where I thought I was going at _all._ ”

“Explain.”

“Well, uhm, when my rift detector went off I thought it was just my dad visiting, but when I went to meet him there was just this _hole_ in the air, so I thought I'd stick my head through and say hi to Dr. Richards or...well, poke around. I know I'm not _supposed_ to, but I _never_ get to see where Dad's from. And then hole sort of... _grabbed_ me, and then I was here. In what I'm guessing is Gotham City. This _is_ Gotham, right?”

Batman nodded. “Correct. What's a rift detector?”

“Here.” Merlin pulled it out of his pocket and held it out. “It's for locating interdimensional rifts, so that I know when Dad's coming to visit.”

“Does he normally travel by boom tube?”

“They don't even _have_ boom tubes where he's from. _Or_ where I'm from. He uses a gate.” With some real food in his stomach it was easier to stop shaking, although having Damian Wayne watching him and holding a baton menacingly wasn't really calming at all.

“Hm. What's your name?”

“Merlin Anthony Baker. And my dad's _not_ Merlyn the Magnificent, his name is Clint Barton and he's a secret agent from another dimension.” Which wasn't something he'd been able to tell anyone in all seriousness since he'd been in elementary school. “Can I have my bow back? It was a birthday present.”

Damian scoffed, but Batman shook his head. “Don't laugh. He's telling the truth.” He lifted one arm and tapped at a device on his wrist. “Green Arrow, come in. This is Batman.”

A light on the device glowed red, and then a small three-dimensional hologram of Green Arrow appeared, hovering above Batman's arm. “Hey, Bats, what is it? I'm kinda busy here.”

“Robin picked someone up. Another boomer. Looks like one of yours. Wanted to know if you recognized him. Turn around.”

“If you say so.” The hologram turned and looked straight at Merlin.

Merlin waved weakly. “Hi, tiny Green Arrow. You're one of my favorite superheroes.”

The hologram of Green Arrow peered at him for a moment. “Purple shirt and quiver says he should be Merlyn the Magnificent, but otherwise I don't recognize him.”

“ _I_ think we should arrest him. He seems very suspicious to me.” Damian had moved in closer to peer at Merlin, a faintly smug expression on his face. “He _knew_ my _name._ ”

Batman let out a thoughtful “hh,” and the hologram of Green Arrow scratched the back of his head, frowning. “Wow, ok, that _is_ a problem. Hey, kid.”

Merlin blinked, startled. “Yessir, Green Arrow sir?”

“You know more names, or was that just a fluke? Also, don't call me sir.”

“I...yes. Yes, I do know more names. I know your name. And his.” He gestured to Batman, who made an almost-startled huffing noise. “I'm, I'm a fan, I'm like Superboy Prime only not crazy and without powers and I don't know if you've even _met_ him or know what I'm talking about at all. Please, I just want to go _home._ ”

Damian, Batman, and the hologram of Green Arrow exchanged looks, and then Green Arrow nodded. “Well, you guys have him, it's up to you. I've got work I need to be doing. Arrow out.” The hologram flickered and disappeared.

Batman opened his mouth to speak, but as he was starting the air was split by another resounding _BOOM_ and then the speaker on his wrist crackled to life. “Batman, it's Oracle. More boomers have just landed outside Gotham Central. It's the Royal Flush Gang, apparently from a technologically-advanced Earth. They're using some kind of laser weapons. We need your assistance.”

Biting his lip in what looked like an aborted desire to curse, Batman flowed to his feet. “On my way, Oracle. Robin,” and he glanced down at Merlin, “stay here on guard. If I'm not back in thirty minutes, take him to the Cave. Kid—Merlin—stay with Robin. We'll find a way to get you home.” Then he leaped onto his motorcycle and was gone, without even waiting for a response.

Merlin and Damian were alone again. Damian sneered down at him. “ _I_ don't trust you. I think you're up to something. And anyway what on _earth_ did you mean by 'just a fan'?”

“Um...I'm not up to anything? I promise? I'm just super lost. Where I'm from you're a comic book character.”

“Oh, _that's_ believable.” A pause, though, and a curious gleam behind the green domino mask. “Am I popular?”

“Well—”

Nearby someone screamed. Damian's head went up, as if he were a dog scenting the wind. There was another scream, and his mouth twisted. “Of all the times for there to be a mugging. You'd think they wouldn't even bother anymore, knowing we're out here. Look, _you_ stay _right_ here or I'll find you and break your kneecaps.” He swung himself back onto his little motorcycle. “And don't go blabbing my name all over the place. I'll be right back. Understood?”

Merlin nodded mutely.

“I should hope so. I'll be right back.” He roared off.

After a stunned moment Merlin struggled to his feet. _It couldn't hurt to stretch my legs, right?_ He paced back and forth a little bit, did a few basic arm strength exercises, considered pulling out his iTab and doing some reading. Batman had taken his bow and his rift detector, so it wasn't like he could really go anywhere anyway. He was _so_ lost. Sitting back down and reading would probably be the best option.

Something brushed his shoulder. He jumped and turned to look, but nobody was there. _Must have been my imagination._

Just as he was starting to relax there was a brush on his other shoulder, and a low voice from a nearby alley whispered, “Hey, kid.”

He stared at the alley but couldn't see anything.

This time whatever it was brushed the small of his back.

He couldn't help it. He screamed, an undignified sound with a brief crack to mezzo soprano in the middle, and ran. The best he could to was to run in the direction that Damian had gone in and hope that he could somehow catch up with the younger boy, or meet him coming back the other way. This wasn't happening. This was a nightmare. Soon something _completely_ insane would happen, and then he'd wake up in bed at home and smell one of his moms making breakfast and he'd come downstairs and tell them, “Hey, Mom, Also-Mom, wanna hear something crazy? I dreamed that I was in Gotham.”

Panting, he rounded the corner where he'd seen Damian turn and ran full-force into someone, falling back onto his ass on the sidewalk. “Shit, sorry, I'm sorry, I wasn't looking where I was going—”

“Hush, child.”

The voice was deep, male and strangely accented, and Merlin looked up—and up, and up, to a massively muscled chest and past that to a black-and-white mask in which glowed red eyes. “Oh, _shit._ ”

The mask was expressionless, but the way Bane shook his head spoke not just volumes but libraries of disapproval. “That is an uncouth way of speaking, child. There are ladies present.”

“Ladies...?” But even as Merlin asked the question he heard the sound of other people surrounding him, and he looked up into more familiar faces. “Holy sh—crap, you're the Secret Six.”

“Good, you've heard of us. Saves time on introductions.” Deadshot rolled his neck, not lowering his gun.

“Now. Kid.” Merlin's eyes crossed as Scandal Savage lowered one of her blades to almost touch the tip of his nose. “Our employer requested that we try to bring in all the boomers alive, but he didn't say they had to be intact. Are you going to make this difficult?”

“Um...this is probably a bad time to be saying this, but is there any way that I can say I find you very attractive and not get punched?”

Scandal's eyes widened in faint surprise over her mask, and she shook her head. “Not a one, kid.”

“You can tell me that if you like, little one. Later. Have I missed anything? The boy was very hard to evade.” That smell from behind him, of cold graveyards and expensive perfume, had to be Jeannette.

“Nope. Kid hasn't done anything but sit here and look stupid.” Deadshot lowered his gun.

“Hey!”

“Ah. Excellent.” A rustling of fabric behind him, and then a cool hand pressed a damp cloth to his nose and mouth. “Breathe deep, little one. It'll make this much easier.”

He held his breath for a moment, but then someone—presumably Jeannette—pressed a cold finger against the back of his neck, and he let out a startled gasp and inhaled something that smelled deadly sweet, and everything got very dark.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Up next: Well, shit. It's the Secret Six. He's in trouble now. Witness the thrilling action as the Secret Six scare a teenage boy shitless and rob a convenience store (sort of) on the way to their rendezvous with their current employer!
> 
>  
> 
> **Actual End Notes**
> 
>  
> 
> Fair warning, people. This story actually isn't complete, thus the uncertain number of chapters. I have three more chapters finished and am writing at a fairly steady clip, though, so hopefully my exciting tale will be finished *before* I run out of buffer.
> 
> If you're enjoying the story, please tell me! I live for your comments!
> 
> Later, that same evening (otherwise known as edited, same day): I am now also findable on Tumblr! If you'd like to say hi to me without leaving a comment, or are potentially interested in seeing random deleted scene bits and dialogue pieces that didn't make it into my stories, hit me up at dangerouscommiesubversive.tumblr.com and take a look. (Well, it's a bit bare right now, I just made the thing.)


	2. Six Degrees Of In Deep Shit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Everyone's favorite team of (evil) underdogs haul their captive fanboy back to the lair of their current mysterious employer--with a stop on the way, for snacks!

Merlin woke up in the back of a van, hands and feet bound in front of him and a cottony feeling in his mouth. His head felt heavy, and his neck hurt, and his quiver, cell phone, and wallet were gone, although he could still feel the lump of the iTab in his pocket. In the dim light he could see Scandal in the driver's seat, with Jeannette sitting next to her. The other members of the Six sat on the van floor with him.

He shifted and couldn't help but make a pained noise when the glare from a streetlight caught his eyes. “Ow...”

Heads turned, and Catman said, “He's awake.”

_“Excuse me, did we wake you?”_ A masked, spidery figure loomed suddenly in his view. _“Did you have lovely dreams?”_

Merlin reared back, pressing himself against the wall of the van, trying to pull himself into a ball. That mask had haunted his worst dreams ever since, at eleven, he'd found his mom's _Secret Six_ comics and read them all in a day. Ragdoll. Ragdoll was right there in front of him. He was going to get crushed and die horribly. He tried to say something, but all he managed was a choked squawking noise.

“Back off, 'Doll, you're scaring the kid.”

_“Who, me? Am I scary? I didn't think I was scary, I thought I was jolly fun.”_ Ragdoll moved away a bit and sat on the floor across from Merlin, his knees pointing high above his head. _“Pardon me, am I scary?”_

Merlin nodded, not trusting himself to speak.

_“Oh, poo.”_

“Breathe, kid.” Deadshot had rolled his mask up and was smoking. “What's got you so worked up, anyway?”

That made him almost smile—or at least it would have if he weren't so terrified. “You mean apart from getting drugged and kidnapped?”

“Yeah, we knew that part. Besides that.”

“Isn't that enough?”

Deadshot paused to think about it, and Catman shrugged. “I suppose that's fair. Although normally Ragdoll doesn't scare people that badly.”

Merlin snorted. “He would if they knew what I know.”

“Yes?” Bane was a hulking figure with his back against the driver's seat, silhouetted in light. “And what do you know?”

“A lot, actually. In context.”

“Hey. Sis.” Deadshot was craning his neck to look out of the windshield. “Pull over, huh? I need some smokes.”

Scandal glanced back at him quickly. “At the Grab'n'Go here? You want to stop and buy cigarettes in the middle of a job?”

“Gotta get 'em some time.”

A pause, and then, “Sure, why not. I could use a snack.”

“I support this,” Bane rumbled. “You have not eaten in some time. You must keep your strength up. Perhaps a protein bar.”

There was a murmur of assent from the others as the van began to pull over to the curb, and then Deadshot said, “Shit, wait, we can't all go in. Someone's gonna have to stay with the kid.”

_“I'm not especially hungry, actually. If you'll just bring me some pudding cups and a magazine with an article about obese people I'll stay with him.”_

Merlin felt his stomach clench. “Oh god, no. _Please_ don't leave me with him.”

Catman sighed. “You do know that you don't actually get a say in this, right?”

“Please! I'll do anything!”

Deadshot ground out the butt of his cigarette on the van floor. “Kid—”

“I'll beg! I'll sing—”

“No singing,” said Bane and Jeannette together, causing them to glance at each other with some unrest.

“I swear, I'll do anything, I'll...I will suck your dick and get a _neck_ tattoo that says 'I suck dick for the Secret Six,' only _please_ don't leave me with Ragdoll.”

There was a long, tense, awkward silence, and then Deadshot leaned forward to peer at him and said, “Kid, how _old_ are you?”

“S-sixteen and a half. Um. Three-quarters. Almost seventeen.”

_“Am I really that frightening?”_

Jeannette nodded slowly. “Yes, my dear, to those of us who pay close attention.”

Scandal leaned forward to rest her head on the steering wheel. “ _Nothing_ is getting sucked. Floyd, if you're actually considering that seriously I'm going to cut your hands off and leave you to bleed in an alley.”

“The hell kind of a guy do you think I am, sis? Look, kid, if we leave you by yourself you'll just try to run off.”

“No! No I won't!” Merlin shook his head as hard as he could, as if he could provide sincerity with more violent movement. “I'll stay right here! I promise!”

Bane was rolling his mask up as he unlocked the van door. “Child, if you break this promise then we will find you again.”

“It won't be nice.” Scandal fixed him with a meaningful look.

“No, seriously, I won't go anywhere!”

Once they had gone into the convenience store Merlin began to look around for something he could do to free himself. _Promises don't count if you make them to bad guys, right?_ They hadn't actually tied his hands very tightly, probably because he'd been unconscious, and so once he had his hands back he untied his feet and began searching the van for anything that might have been useful. There wasn't much, but he _did_ find a few paper clips and rubber bands in the glovebox, and an abandoned pencil underneath the passenger seat.

It wasn't much, but it was something. He hadn't gotten suspended for a week in seventh grade for _nothing._

 

\--

 

_“I don't think I'm scary enough to rate sexual favors from minors.”_ Ragdoll was perched on top of one of the shelves in the Grab'n'Go, sorting through the selection of pudding and gelatin cups with what looked like a discerning eye. He inspected a container of green Jello closely as Catman snagged a massive bag of beef jerky. _“Do you think I'm scary, Thomas?”_

Blake ignored him, but at the counter Floyd rolled his eyes. “You creep the fuck out of me, Doll. Two cartons.” The terrified clerk got him his cigarettes, started to give him his total, and then backed away slowly at the sight of the gun pointed at his head. “Anyway I doubt he really _meant_ it.”

_“Bane, what do you think? Am I frightening?”_

“I think that you have been eating too much junk food, Scandal Savage.” He plucked the bag of chips out of her hand with a disapproving frown and handed her several granola bars as behind him Jeannette stifled a laugh. “Ragdoll, you are a child's nightmare, and he is still quite young.”

_“I suppose you're right. It is an image I've cultivated.”_ Ragdoll picked out a stack of pudding cups, snatched a package of plastic spoons from next to them, and then arched backwards to grab an issue of _USA Today_ from the newsstand.

Blake headed for the door. The clerk got Floyd a pack of lighters, Jeannette raided a small display of lollipops, and behind Bane's back Scandal rolled her eyes, got some jerky to go with her granola bars, and concealed a bag of potato chips and a can of beer inside her jacket.

They were filling a couple of bags with their selections when from outside, they heard a faint twang, and then Blake biting off an, “Ow! _Fuck._ Little shit—”

As one they hurried for the door, Bane leaving a crumpled fifty-dollar bill on the counter behind him.

Outside, Blake was standing in front of the open van, and there was a _pencil_ dangling from the side of one of his eye sockets, just above a tear duct. He had one hand twisted in the collar of their captive's shirt, and in the other hand he held a gleaming thing which turned out to be a tiny bow made from paper clips and rubber bands. At the approach of the others he looked up, scowling, the pencil still protruding from his face. “He _shot_ me.”

“Fuck, Blake, you oughtta pull that out. Good way to get an infection.” Floyd moved forward, seized Blake's chin, and yanked the pencil from his eye socket, causing a lot more swearing in the process. “Shit, that was in deep. Lemme see that bow a second.”

“I _know_ that, Lawton, it was in my _face._ ” Blake handed him the bow and gave the boy dangling from his grip a shake. “If you do that again I'll cut your fingers off. Seriously.” Blood ran down the side of his nose and dripped onto the ground.

“Look, can we continue this discussion while making some useful progress towards our drop-off?” Scandal climbed back into the driver's seat of the van and leaned across to unlock the passenger door for Jeannette. “Just secure the cargo and get your asses in the van.”

Once they were well under way again, with the kid more securely tied up in the corner, Floyd began to inspect the tiny bow and the bloody pencil. He admired the way the paperclips had been unfolded and then twisted back together, and looked closely at where the pencil eraser had been notched with a thumbnail so it could nocked against the rubber bands. “That was some shooting, kid. Who taught you?”

The boomer kid stared at him for a moment, looking terrified, and then stammered, “M-my dad. And some other people, but mainly my dad.”

“Really? So who's your...wait. Shit.”

Blake looked up from where he was applying disinfectant to his puncture wound. “Wait, are you thinking that...”

“Man's got a reputation. Can't keep it in his pants.”

“I swear I'm not in any way related to Merlyn the Magnificent! People keep asking me that!”

Floyd blinked. “Not what I was thinking, but it's good that's out of the way. What I was _thinking_ was, we may have another junior Arrow on our hands.”

“Do I _look_ like I can grow a luxurious fucking beard? I can't even manage sideburns!”

“It'll come in time, kid. Assuming you don't try shooting me again and our employer doesn't have us off you.” Blake finished plastering on the field dressing he'd gotten out and pulled his mask back down over it. “So not Green Arrow. You're not Deathstroke's son, right?”

The kid shuddered. “No.”

_“Floyd, you wonderful devil.”_ Ragdoll flowed over from his corner of the van and gestured expressively with his pudding-covered spoon. _“Have you been keeping secrets from us?”_

“Hey, he ain't my kid.” Floyd poked the side of the kid's head. “I'da remembered banging a chick with hair like his. Anyway, how old d'you think I am?”

“Look, you don't know my dad, all right? I'm from a different dimension. And he's from another one.”

Bane shook his head slowly. “Your origins are unnecessarily complicated.”

“Look, I can't help it if my moms went a little far for a sperm donor! It's not like everyone can get a nice, uncomplicated childhood in a maximum security prison full of flesh-eating rats.”

After a tense pause, the vast mercenary said, “Where did you hear of the rats?”

“We're here, children,” Jeannette said from the front seat. “I'm sure you can continue this fascinating conversation after we've delivered our package.”

 

\--

 

The building wasn't the standard abandoned Gotham warehouse that Merlin had been expecting. It was abandoned, sure, but it was some kind of office building, half of a decaying Wayne Enterprises sign still clinging to the front. Other than a single light in one of the windows, it looked entirely uninhabited, but when they got closer to the door Merlin spotted a discreet logo hidden in the graffiti. Entwined in the tags and spray paint art over the door was a single, massive question mark in glowing neon green.

They hauled him through a maze of hallways until they reached a part of the building where the walls were clean, the carpets were new, and the lights were working. A few silent, green-suited goons passed them in the halls without comment. Merlin saw all of this upside-down, having been slung unceremoniously over Bane's shoulder as they got out of the van. By the time they reached whatever spot they'd been aiming for the blood was rushing to his head fairly badly, which was followed by a dizzying headrush as they entered a room and Bane dropped him into a folding chair.

The far end of the room hosted a bank of computers and a vast array of peripherals. A man was sitting in a high-backed executive office chair at the central keyboard, and as they entered he spun to face them, fingers steepled in front of his chest, face shadowed by the brim of a vividly green bowler hat.

The Riddler leaned forward to peer at Merlin, who was staring at him, eyes wide. “So what's the catch of the day?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up: Man, this day keeps getting worse and worse for the poor kid, doesn't it? Can he keep it together?
> 
> **Useful Explanatory Notes**
> 
> On the making of tiny bows: I have a friend who actually does this. If left to his own devices for long enough, he will inevitably find the supplies to create a tiny bow--and they have a surprising amount of firing power. I have no idea if a pencil would actually make viable ammo, but hey, it's a comic-book universe. If Bullseye can throw an unfolded paperclip directly into someone's esophagus, I don't see any reason why Merlin can't shoot a pencil into Catman's face.


	3. Into The Fire

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which our young hero manages to avoid getting killed, but only by getting himself in much deeper trouble.

“You missed the cyberpunk Royal Flush Gang.”

Deadshot shrugged. “The Bat was already there, _and_ the Birds of Prey. Would've been too much of a hassle, and you said lie low.”

“Doesn't really bother me, I never had any use for those pathetic morons.” The Riddler tipped his hat back to get the shadow of the brim out of his eyes. “Who's this kid? Did you learn anything interesting while you were taking your sweet time getting back here? Also, what the hell happened to _him?_ ” He jerked his chin at Catman.

“The kid happened to him. Shot a pencil into his face with this.” Deadshot held up the paper clip bow. “Other than that, we saw him talking to the Bat and Robin, and he's a little excitable, but as far as we can figure he ain't anything special.”

“Hey!”

Riddler frowned contemplatively. “Huh. Good shooting. Lots of purple in the outfit. Seems fairly straightforward, he's Mer—”

“Oh, for _fuck's_ sake! Do I look like a fifty-something with a receding hairline and a bad temper? _Why_ does everyone think I'm Merlyn the Magnificent? Does he have a _habit_ of snagging the nearest boom tube and dropping in on Gotham City?”

“Someone's touchy. What are you, then, his son? Nephew? Young ward? What's your name?” At the sight of a microscopic flinch Riddler grinned. “Oh, cute, it _is_ Merlin. That's why you're so touchy.”

Merlin grimaced. “Not my fault my moms are nerds.”

“And they named you after _him?_ ”

“It's a _pun._ My dad's called Hawkeye. One of my moms is a magician.”

“And a merlin is a kind of hawk. Oh, that _is_ sad.” Riddler looked back up at the Six. “Well, I've learned everything I need to know. Get rid of him.”

Scandal scowled. “We go to all the trouble, Catman gets shot, you talk to him for five minutes and then we get rid of him? That's the fifth one you've had us ice, not even counting the extra-creepy Joker with the mouth scarring. You're throwing a lot of money at us to bring you boomers that you just dump.”

That got a roll of the eyes. “He's a civilian from another universe, his mothers are lesbians who got a sperm donation from a close friend in show business, and he's a professional athlete. Don't make that face at me, look at his calluses. I'm paying you to bring me _interesting_ people. I almost _wish_ you'd picked up Scarface instead of shooting him, he would have at least had something to talk about besides his latest cover of _Sports Illustrated._ Get rid of him, there'll be more boomers tomorrow.”

More scowling from the rest of the Six, and Deadshot starting checking the ammo in his guns as Bane hauled Merlin out of the chair. Merlin seemed to be in shock until his stomach hit Bane's shoulder, and then his eyes went wide. He pounded on Bane's back with his bound hands. “Wait! Wait wait wait! I—I have a riddle! For you!”

Riddler had already started to turn back to his bank of computers. “Like I haven't heard that one before. But hit me. I could use a laugh.”

The Six paused at the door, and Merlin said, breathlessly, “Living I'm worthless, until death gives me value. But _dead,_ the value is gone.”

“That would be interesting if you _had_ any hostage value.”

“Please don't have them kill me! I have information!”

“Unconvincing. I have no evidence that your information is of any use to me.”

“I...” By now he looked panicked. “I know names. I know faces. I know _everything_ about this world and everyone in it.”

The Six tensed slightly. Riddler didn't turn his chair back to face them, but one eyebrow did rise in the shadow of his hat. “Cute. Well, then, tell me something I don't know.”

“I, uh...” An expression that might have been called cunning in someone less obviously terrified flitted over Merlin's face. “Why don't I start with something you _do_ know?”

“What use would _that—_ ”

“Mr. Nashton?”

Riddler's hand tightened slightly on the arm of his chair. “Where did you hear that name?”

Merlin let out a relieved sigh. “Promise not to kill me and I'll tell you.”

“I don't think you're in any position to make me promise _anything._ If you don't tell me voluntarily I can just have my contractors here beat it out of you. Now _where_ did you hear that name?”

“Same place where I found out the name of _her_ girlfriend and _his_ daughter.” Merlin jerked his chin at Scandal and Deadshot.

There was, very suddenly, a gun resting against the tip of his nose, and Deadshot ground out, “Y'know, kid, that ain't exactly an incentive to _not_ kill you.”

“I, uh, I, I...” Merlin's eyes crossed as he tried to focus on the gun. “It's not like I _only_ know about criminals. And I'm not the only one who knows. And if you kill me you won't find out _anything._ ”

Slowly, tensely, the Riddler nodded. “I'll grant that you have a compelling point, and you've definitely piqued my interest. All right, kid, I promise not to have you killed. Gun down, please, Mr. Lawton.”

“Oh, good—”

“For now.” The Riddler jumped to his feet and gave the chair an almost jaunty spin. “All right, everyone, new plan. Let's find somewhere to stash our boomer. I might have an auction to plan.”

“Hey, wait, _what?_ ”

 

\--

 

By the time they found an unused office to stash him in, Merlin was well on his way to having a full-blown panic attack. He was hyperventilating so much that it was hard to focus on things, and he was pretty sure that his heartbeat could have powered a small automobile. It didn't help matters when, as soon as they'd stopped, Deadshot grabbed him by the collar and slammed him into the wall. “ _How'd_ you find out about her? How long have you been spying on me?” When Merlin didn't reply Deadshot shook him again. “How much do you know?”

“I, I, I,” he stammered, face red, eyes wide. “A-ages. I know all _kinds_ of stuff about you.”

The other members of the Six were gathered at the office door, listening with interest as Deadshot said, “Yeah? Prove it.”

“You. You pulled a gun on Catman his first night with the Six.”

Deadshot blinked at him. “Shit, kid, anyone coulda guessed that.”

“N-no, but, then he cooked. He made eggs. You asked for a Denver omelet with tons of peppers and he said that it was a sign that you have a death wish. And that he can't make anything else except a haunch of raw zebra.”

After a long moment Catman said, “Fuck.”

_“Excuse me, are you perhaps psychic? That would explain why you've been so upset by me, I_ do _have a number of unusual interests.”_

“No, I'm not psychic, it's just...” Merlin sagged in Deadshot's grip. “...you're comic book characters.”

Beat.

_“Pardon me, I thought I heard you say I was a comic book character.”_

“You are. Where I'm from.”

_“How unspeakably delightful.”_

Another beat.

Then, Scandal. “We popular?”

“...sort of? You're cult favorites. Your book got canceled when they did a big reboot, couple of years before I was born. My moms have all of it.”

“I am puzzled.” Bane plucked him from Deadshot's grip and set him down on the moldering desk in the center of the office. “People read of our exploits? And _enjoy_ it?”

Merlin laughed weakly. “Pretty much, yeah. I've read all about you. So I'm...I'm fucking terrified here.”

“Understandable.” Frowning, Bane turned and headed for the door. “I must think on this, before I sleep. We should all sleep. It is past your bedtime, Scandal Savage.”

Scandal looked as if she was about to argue, but then shook her head. “Yeah, I could use some time to let this sink in too. G'night, kid. We're going to lock you in. If you try to escape I'll let Blake chop your fingers off.”

The Six filed out, slowly, muttering to themselves, until the only one left was Catman. He hovered at the open door for a moment, deep in thought. “Kid. In your comic books.”

Merlin looked up from where he was huddled on the desk. “Yeah?”

“Am I a hero?”

“...no.”

“Oh. ...am I a joke?”

“Um.” Merlin blushed. “Not anymore. You're, uh...actually you're kind of a sex symbol. Now.”

“Really.”

“Yeah, uh, with the, uh, the muscles and the claw thing and the, uh, the casual nudity. And the. Um. You're very popular. With fans.”

“Huh.” Catman nodded slowly. “Interesting. Anyway, try to get some sleep. And not escape, in the interest of keeping your fingers. Just saying.”

He left. The lock clicked.

Merlin curled up on top of the desk, pulled his hood up, and tried not to think about death.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up: We finally get to see what's going on with our friend over in the Marvel Universe! (Or rather the Altered Marvel Cinematic Universe; the 616 universe isn't involved yet. Is this getting confusing?)
> 
> **Actual Explanatory Notes**
> 
> The hostage riddle: No, Merlin isn't some kind of riddling genius. He (and I) cribbed his riddle about hostages from Michael Swanwick's astounding novel _The Iron Dragon's Daughter_ , which is really good as long as you're prepared for sex and violence.
> 
> I can't really see Ragdoll being anything but pleased to learn that he's a comic book character. Man, he's fun to write.
> 
> Also, sorry about the short chapter--these first few really are bite-sized, aren't they? After this they become much meatier.


	4. Worlds Away

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Back in the Marvel Universe, our old friends there get started on a path that will lead to worlds colliding!
> 
> Also, everyone wants Nightwing. Seriously.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoo, new chapter today, because yesterday's was such a shrimp. This one is a bit meatier, now that we're really getting into the bulk of the story.

_Two days later and several dimensions away_

The seminar room was small and intimate. Instead of desks it had a single large table, and the one chalkboard was blank. Seven students sat around the table, fidgeting with Tarot decks and making notes.

The only really unusual thing in the room was their professor, who sat at the head of the table, talking animatedly. He looked as if he were barely thirty-five, almost a student himself, and his slightly overlong hair was a mess of conflicting colors, pulled back into a ponytail to reveal slightly pointed ears with many, many piercings. He wore a suit, but instead of a sober blue or grey, it was deep green, and in lieu of a proper buttoned shirt he had on a t-shirt with a print of Picasso's “Nude Descending a Staircase.” An extremely punk TA with a lip piercing and a neck tattoo in German blackletter sat next to him, grading papers.

“Now, as we've finished coverage of the basic methods of divination, we're going to be making a brief diversion into the field of chaos magic, as it's an excellent place to begin an interdisciplinary study of contemporary methods of practice. The most popular introductory text on the subject is Carroll's _Liber Null and Psychonaut_ , but it's a bit obtuse at the best of times, so instead we'll be reading—why hello, Jeremy. Joining us at last? You're only fifteen minutes late today.”

Everyone looked up as another student hurried into the room, stumbling as the strap of his bookbag caught on the door handle. “I'm sorry, Professor Clark—”

“You ought to be. You know, Jeremy, that when you show up late like this you're disrupting the class for all of your—”

“—but Captain Britain's outside!”

The other seven students straightened, looking excited, and burst into murmurs.

“He's got a chap with an eyepatch with him, they said they need to talk to you.”

The professor was the only one who didn't look thrilled and intrigued by this news. He let out a long sigh and rubbed at his temples. “Tell them they can wait until after class, I have office hours then.” Jeremy didn't move. “Well? Go on, then, we can wait.”

The class waited in tense expectation, and a few minutes later Jeremy returned. He looked horrified by something, but all he managed to choke out was, “They say it's urgent, Professor.”

The professor looked at him closely and then shook his head. “They didn't really say it like that, did they?”

Under the weight of nine gazes, Jeremy said, “...no.”

“What did he actually say? Go on, I can take it.”

Still looking horrified, Jeremy took a deep breath and said, “The one with the eyepatch said, 'Tell Loki's cabana boy to get his tattooed ass out here or I'll have it extradited.'”

A couple of students giggled, shocked, and the TA leaned back in her chair slightly and glanced at the back of the professor's neck, where the edges of a tattoo did show above the collar of his suit jacket. The professor sighed again. “Well, then. You all have the exercise packet; do exercises one, two, and three in your assigned pairs and write up your findings. E-mail those to me by this Friday, and give the hard copies to Gretchen if I'm not available. And have _Condensed Chaos_ read for next class. If I can't make it Gretchen will be teaching. I'll record a lecture. Class dismissed.”

He gathered his things and swept out. The students and Gretchen the TA stared after him.

Captain Britain and Nick Fury were waiting in the quad outside the building. Students slowed as they walked past, whispering, and when the professor reached them Captain Britain had been approached by one blushing freshman, who giggled incessantly as he signed the cover of her notebook. When she looked up and saw who had arrived she giggled more, thanked Captain Britain breathlessly, and hurried off to where a group of her friends stood waiting for her.

The professor nodded. “Captain Britain. Director Fury.”

Nick Fury nodded in return. “Discord.”

“Please. I work here. I'm only Discord in my free time. To what do I owe the unexpected class interruption, gentlemen?”

Captain Britain shook hands, smiling pleasantly. “Sorry we had to disturb you, Professor Clark—”

“You're welcome to call me Simon, Captain.”

“Simon, then...we understand you were busy. I'm only here as an escort. Political reasons, you see.”

“Certainly. We wouldn't want it to look like SHIELD has no respect for borders or local government, would we? Not that it's your fault, of course.”

Without preamble, Nick Fury said, “Discord, Dr. Richards got a phone call last night from your _cousin._ ”

Simon shrugged. “So what? She can call whoever she likes.”

Fury made a noise that sounded like a snort. “Setting _aside_ how she managed to get his number, _and_ how she managed to place an interdimensional phone call when she's not supposed to be able to...your nephew is missing.”

There was a pause. Simon stared at him. “What do you mean, missing? He can't have just run off to Sal's house again, or you wouldn't be bugging me, so...”

“ _Missing._ From the middle of town. No trace of him. A few locals said they heard what sounded like an explosion. Know anyone who blows things up when they dimension-hop?” Fury's one eye was icey.

“You're not suggesting that _I_...or that _Loki..._ ” Simon looked horrified. “Ok, what the hell _are_ you suggesting?”

“You're the only extradimensional being we currently know of, Discord. And the only reason we haven't _arrested_ your ass five times over is because you're the only early warning sign we've _got_ if your boyfriend gets in a killing mood. Do you know where your nephew is? He get in an argument with his moms and decide he wanted to go stay with his uncle?”

“Oh, for...Merlin doesn't _trust_ me that much. I mean, yeah, family's family, but it's not like he doesn't know what I do for fun, and the kid reads way too many comic books to want to bunk with a supervillain. And he _hates_ Loki. And before you ask, _no,_ I didn't _kidnap_ him, what reason would I have to do that?”

They all stood for a moment, staring at each other, and then Fury nodded slowly again. “All right, then. Just so we've got that out of the way.”

“Oh, _fuck_ you, you didn't ever think I had anything to do with it. What's this really about?”

“Apart from Dr. Richards, we only know of one real expert in interdimensional travel, and you're the most reliable way to get in touch with him.”

“Wait, are you saying that—”

“We need to talk to Loki.”

“I can't just—”

“Look, Discord, either you _take_ us to him or I _arrest_ you and make him come to us. I don't want that. _You_ don't want that. We are prepared to make a deal with him for his assistance, in the interests of increasing our understanding of the structure of the multiverse.”

After a moment Simon sighed. “Well, ok. If you insist. But you better have someone with you he'll _want_ to talk to.”

 

\--

 

Loki unfolded himself from his seat on the floor, eyes opening slowly as he moved to colonize the couch. “He's no longer in his home dimension.”

Billy Kaplan frowned, nodding. “We figured that. Or, well, Dr. Richards and Mr. Stark figured that. Do you know where he is?”

“I haven't the faintest idea, other than that he's enormously far away, dimensionally speaking. Much farther than I've ever been.”

“You don't _know?_ ” The third member of the visiting party, along with Captain Britain and Billy, was Steve Rogers, currently out of uniform and looking fairly worried. “I thought this sort of thing was your specialty.”

Loki shot him an irritated look. “Hardly. _Travel_ is a field I've studied, but without specialized equipment like the Allfather's throne I have no particular skill at far-seeing or divination. If _that_ was what you wanted you could have just asked Bobby.”

“Bobby?” Puzzled, Steve looked over at the man in question, who was sitting on the end of the couch with Loki's feet in his lap. “I didn't know you could...well...and am I supposed to be calling you Simon now?”

“Do things Loki can't do? Of course I can. And yes, I'd prefer Simon.” Simon grinned. “Anyway I wouldn't be very helpful if I could only do the things he does, especially given my comparative lack of magical power. My skill set is actually very different.”

Billy turned faintly pink at that, which Steve didn't notice, continuing on with, “So will we be able to get him back? Can you help?”

“I should presume so, assuming I like whatever deal Fury is willing to offer me. I would need Bobby's assistance in pinpointing the precise location, and my power reserves alone will not be sufficient to cross such a great distance, but I should be able to get the idiot boy back to his doting mothers.”

“You don't sound like you like him very much.”

“He devotes too much time to his sport and not enough to his studies. And his personal antipathy towards me certainly doesn't help. Nor does his mother's, for that matter.”

Captain Britain had been staring off into the middle distance, apparently pondering something. Abruptly he said, “I'm sure you know that I've done some work between dimensions myself, but this is rather farther afield than I've gone in the past. What happens to young Merlin if you're unable to retrieve him?”

Loki shrugged. “There are two options. The first is fairly obvious, and of the two the more likely: he dies.” Then he shifted to sit up more comfortably. “The second is rather more complicated.”

Several rooms away the kettle screamed, and Simon moved Loki's feet out of his lap and hopped up. “Ooh, water's ready for tea. I'll be back in a minute.”

As he hurried out to the kitchen, Billy said, “So? What is it? What's the second option?”

Loki rolled his neck. “Going between dimensions is not the same as travel between countries—except in your case, Captain Britain, but yours is special. Anyway, it is, despite what you may have seen and assumed, more permanent. If Merlin is trapped in another world permanently, he will...change. Assimilate. He may retain some memory of his former life, but he will no longer be the boy his mothers know. He will be, eventually, a true denizen of the world he inhabits, on all but the most bone-deep level.”

Billy's brow crinkled. “Wait, what? What do you mean?”

“I said it was complicated.”

“Well, go ahead anyway, it's not like you haven't ever taught me about complicated things.”

“True, you are a fairly quick learner. But take my priest, for an example.” One long-fingered hand gestured in the direction of the kitchen. “He has lived in this world twenty years. He breathes its air, eats its food, drinks its water, tastes of its...” a smirk, “pleasures. It is a dangerous thing to do. A fairy fruit, one might say. He is beginning to forget that he ever lived elsewhere or had another life. If he didn't visit Shelly and her wife and child so often he'd forget them too—would have already, in fact, but for the fact that Agent Barton reminds him to call whenever they meet. Already he ages differently, He does not recall the names of his parents.”

The three men sitting across from him looked horrified, and Steve said, “That's—”

“It is the _way_ of things. Those parents, from that world, are no longer part of his...origin story, one might say. Eventually he will recall only that he was a shop clerk, an almost-starving artist, until I seduced him and he came to follow me.”

“...how can you do that to him?” Steve glanced towards the kitchen with an expression that had moved from horror to the kind of protective offense that served him so well on the battlefield.

Loki shook his head. “ _I'm_ not doing anything to him. Or, well, not like that. He chose this life himself, freely.” He settled back against the arm of the couch, no longer looking at them but at some point in the air above his knees. “Giving creature that he is, he offered himself to me entire. I simply accepted his offer. I haven't done anything to _prevent_ his assimilation into this world; I do enjoy his company.” A contemplative pause. “And inasmuch as I am capable of it, I do love him. I would not willingly give him up.”

After that there was an extended silence, nobody knowing quite how to respond. Then Simon returned with the tea, and Loki shook himself out of his reverie. “In any case, that is what will happen to Merlin. Either he will die, or he will forget his former life and make a place for himself in his new world.” He accepted a cup of tea from Simon and moved his feet so that the other man could sit back down. “He's clever enough that he probably won't make too much of a mess of things, assuming he can keep his mouth under control.” He took a sip of his tea and thought about it for a moment. “Which I sincerely doubt.”

 

\--

 

Merlin was pretty sure that he'd deserve some kind of comic book trivia medal if he managed not to die. He'd spent _hours_ talking to the Riddler—or rather, being talked _at._ The Riddler _loved_ to talk, throwing out theory after theory and watching Merlin's reactions to see which ones were true.

“Let's see. Green Arrow. I have a few ideas there, but first and foremost, I'm thinking Oliver Queen. ...true? I thought so. Brought down by a beard. If he loves it so much he should have a false one made for when he's in costume, go clean-shaven as a civilian. All right, then, so that would make Aresenal or Red Arrow or whatever he's calling himself right now that Harper kid, I assume...good, right again.”

If he survived he'd also need to develop a poker face.

The worse parts were the ones where Riddler _didn't_ have a theory, though; it was hard to avoid answering the man's questions, especially when they came so quickly, and when he did, actually, know the answers. Who led the Birds of Prey? What was their background? How were they connected to Batman? Who was Azrael, where was he from? What was his connection to Batman? Why? What were Lex Luthor's connections to Superman? What about Superman's connection to Clark Kent, the reporter in Metropolis?

“I won't ask you who Batman is, that'd be too easy, I want to figure that one out myself. Once I know who he is, anyway, it'll be easy to figure out his kid sidekicks. How many of those _have_ there been, kid? Ok, you don't look sure, let's make this easier...two Robins? Three? Four? Five? Ok, four or five, I like complicated answers. We'll talk about that more later, now what about the others, the Batgirls. Two of those, right? Right. First one disappeared the same time Joker shot Barbara Gordon, so I'm guessing she was it. ...thought so. Not that knowing who _she_ is tells me much. How do boom tubes work?”

The quick change in direction had startled Merlin, enough that he actually said something. “I...I'm not sure, actually. I've always been kind of fuzzy on how they do what they do.”

“So you _do_ talk. I thought you'd gone mute or something.”

“I _can_ talk. I just don't _want_ to. I try _not_ to talk to criminals.”

Riddler rolled his eyes. “You may be the most self-righteous teenager I've ever met, kid, and I deal with Robins on a regular basis. Anyway, I hear you were fine talking to the Six, and they can barely string three words together. So you don't know how boom tubes work.”

“Not even a little. New Genosian tech shit gives me a headache.”

“Now _that_ was a reasonable answer. I also agree, their technology is probably the least sane thing I've ever encountered. Thing, mind you, not person, I suspect you know _plenty_ about the least sane person I've ever met. More than me, I hope, we'll be getting to him later.”

That evening, Merlin curled up again on the desk in the disused office that was, for the moment, his prison cell. He'd pulled the desk into a corner, below an air vent apparently on the same duct as one of the main control rooms of whatever Riddler's operation here was. It was a good spot for eavesdropping; he could at least learn something. He'd already gotten some interesting details about a few other boomers who'd been spotted—the Flash/Batman hybrid who'd appeared in Central City and immediately disappeared, a woman with a magic sword who'd reduced several street thugs to a thin red paste in Keystone. He wasn't even the only boomer in custody. With the Secret Six's help, Riddler had apparently also picked up some sort of Victorian version of Black Canary and someone who sounded suspiciously like a Shaquille O'Neal version of Steel, and the cops in Metropolis had arrested a criminal in a red-and-gold Nightwing costume who called himself “Renegade.”

The door opened. He looked up, startled.

Deadshot leaned into the room. “You like eggs, kid? Blake's cooking.”

Merlin started to give his usual response to that question, stopped, thought about it, and realized that under the circumstances it couldn't really get him in any worse trouble. So he marshalled his thoughts, and in his best impersonation of the man who stood in the doorway, replied with, “I like an egg on occasion.”

Deadshot gave him a strange look. “Y'know, kid, that's probably the creepiest thing you could have done right now.”

“Trying to keep my spirits up. I'm in kind of a shitty situation right now.”

“True, true. I'll bring you part of the omelet and some milk or something. Don't think Riddler's ever actually dealt with a kid this long before; doesn't get that you can't just eat granola bars all day like he does.”

Merlin smiled faintly. “Thanks.”

“Don't mention it.” Backing out, Deadshot shut the door again with a quiet mutter of, “Messed right the _hell_ up.”

On his return, Deadshot was accompanied, unexpectedly, by the rest of the Secret Six, who crowded into the office and shut the door behind them. Catman handed him a fork and a plate of eggs and toast, and Bane gave him a glass of orange juice and glared at him until he'd drained it and managed a nervous “Thank you.”

Ragdoll climbed up on the desk next to him and slung a companionable arm around his shoulders, apparently oblivious to the fact that Merlin responded by trying to hide behind his forkload of omelet. _“We've decided we'd like to hear all about these comic books we're in.”_

“Yes.” Bane had also brought a chair, which turned out to be for Scandal, not him—he sat down on the floor next to her and still came up to her shoulder. “I still do not understand why the people of your world would _wish_ to read of me.”

Jeannette glanced down at the carpet, sniffed in distaste, and perched herself demurely on Deadshot's knee. “I can't imagine enjoying it myself. Are there many tales of our daring adventures?”

“Eight volumes. Nine if you count the volume of _Birds of Prey_ where...” Merlin trailed off, glancingly nervously at Scandal. “There are eight volumes. And then there was the New 52 thing that happened and the series got canceled. It was ages ago.”

“Typical.” Deadshot lit a cigarette and leaned out of Jeannette's reach when she tried to pinch it out. “And I hear Blake's some kind of centerfold?”

Scandal jumped slightly. “Him? _Really?_ ”

“He's...something like number two on the list of hottest guys ever.”

Catman looked almost offended. “Number _two?_ What's my competition?”

“It's—”

“Nightwing.”

Everyone turned to stare at Deadshot.

He shrugged. “What?”

_“I think this is a side of you we hadn't seen before, Floyd.”_

“Am I right, kid?”

Merlin snapped out of his shock. “Actually, yeah. It's Nightwing.”

“Knew it.” At everyone's continued staring Deadshot snorted. “Ok, seriously, who else would _you_ think it was? _I'd_ do Nightwing, and I don't even _like_ dudes. In fact, show of hands, who here _wouldn't_ do Nightwing?”

There was a long, long silence in which nobody raised a hand. Scandal started to, momentarily, but then seemed to consider it and put her hand back down.

Smirking, the assassin settled back against the wall and took a puff of his cigarette. “My point proven.”

They did give Merlin a few minutes to eat then, talking quietly among themselves as he plowed through his omelet and toast and wished, quietly, that there were a little more. Deadshot had been right, he _was_ getting tired of granola, and it seemed to be the only thing Riddler ate—the corner of his office was a snowdrift of granola bar wrappers and discarded water bottles. For the moment, though, the only bad thing he had to deal with was Ragdoll's close proximity; as long as he could tamp down his fear of being crushed to death he'd be fine.

As he scarfed down his last slice of toast a snatch of conversation drifted down through the air vent, and the Six looked up. Bane made an approving gesture with one hand. “You have found a good location for listening.”

“I...well, given the situation I didn't want to be out of the loop.”

Everyone fell silent, listening as hard as they could.

“Clear out. Yeah, both of you, I need to make a phone call.”

“Sure thing, boss.”

“Whatever you say, boss.”

A long pause, and then a whine and the faint, crackly noise of someone talking over the video phone line, just too low to be intelligible through the air duct.

“Hey, Calc. Yeah, long time no see, right? Any idea what Luthor's up to with this boom tube business?”

_Crackle crackle crackle._

“Seriously. It's a mess, I have contractors picking them up off the streets of Gotham almost every night. What's his plan here?”

_Crackle crackle._

“Well of course you don't actually know, it's not like he ever tells _anyone_ what he's up to until it's too late. Clean-up's starting to get expensive, though. Speaking of which—”

_Crackle crackle._

“Yeah, I was _getting_ to that. Real reason I called is, I need folding money and I picked up someone interesting a couple nights back.”

_Crackle?_

“In a nutshell. I have a good location, too, you know that opera house in the Garment District here, the one from a few years back? Where Joker and Creeper were trying to fence with bonesaws? Four nights from now, starting at eleven pip emma.”

_Crackle crackle crackle. Crackle crackle. Crackle?_

“That's it. Get the word out, if you would—and bring some cash, you might actually want to bid yourself.”

_Crackle crackle._

“Should be fun. We haven't had an interesting auction in ages.”

Merlin felt the pit of his stomach go cold. He looked down, and saw that the Secret Six were all staring at him.

Scandal looked furious, and she hopped out of her chair in one fluid movement and headed for the door. “I think I'll save my questions for tomorrow. I need to go have a little chat with our employer.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up: What's this auction all about? And won't the Secret Six be pissed that they're not getting a cut of the profits? Plus, a heartfelt prayer, and an interdimensional divination session!
> 
>  
> 
> **Actual Explanatory Notes**
> 
>  
> 
> The books Simon mentions in his interrupted lecture are Liber Null & Psychonaut, by Peter Carroll, and Condensed Chaos, by Phil Hine. Both are popular books for introducing people to the practice of chaos magic. If you're really curious, though, I, like Simon, would recommend starting with Hine--Carroll is a little obtuse.
> 
> Also, business is getting kinda heavy here, isn't it? If you'd like to see something lighter about Merlin, check out ["Loki Holds The Baby,"](http://dangerouscommiesubversive.tumblr.com/post/35060899620/loki-holds-the-baby) a "deleted" scene from God Invasion, which I wrote because [Ook](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Ook/profile) wanted to see Loki interacting with baby Merlin. It's mostly funny.


	5. Objects of Value

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which we find out what's up with this auction business (and its effects on the Secret Six's contract with the Riddler), Merlin gets a taste of some new-fangled religion, and a divination session gets our Marvel heroes heading for Gotham.

How do they get all those wonderful toys?

That's the age-old question of the pickiest of comics fans. _How,_ they say, do supervillains raise the capital to get started on a life of gadget-based crime? How do they afford their ray guns and death traps and matching costumed henchmen?

Well, there are ways. Minor store robberies in classic ski-mask style—that never gets old. A few discreet investors—for a cut of your future profits, of course. Forays into legitimate enterprise and playing the stockmarket—assuming you know how to play.

And then, for the ambitious and intelligent, there's the Hostage Auction.

Rumor has it that the first Auction was held many years ago, by a gang who did all their robberies in tuxedoes. It's simpler than you'd think, and much safer than making a ransom demand yourself. The procedure is thus: snatch someone of obvious hostage value—but not to you—or who has useful skills—ones that you don't need yourself, of course. Work out your starting price. Pick a time. Pick a place—one big enough to hold a few hundred criminals. Then get in touch with the Calculator and tell him you're calling the Auction.

The word spreads very quickly.

You won't get as much for your hostage at Auction as the buyer will when they finally get around to making a ransom demand or taking advantage of said hostage's unique skills. But a kidnapping is a fairly small investment, all things considered.

Merlin _knew_ that was what was happening. That _had_ to be it—the Hostage Auction had gotten a three-issue storyline in _JLA_ right around the time that he'd qualified for the U.S. Olympic team. And _that_ meant the largest assemblage of villains possible outside of a Crisis.

Shit, maybe this _was_ a Crisis. Had he dropped right into the middle of a major crossover event? That'd be just his fucking luck. Why had he mouthed off like that the first night? Why had he paraded around all his sad-sack fanboy knowledge? True, it had kept him from getting killed, but it had been a bad plan, a shitty plan of the _first fucking order._ Never talk back to a Batman villain! That was, like, rule one!

If he survived he was going to have to turn in his nerd card.

His moms were going to disown him. Assuming he ever got to see them again.

Planning. He needed a plan, one that would hopefully keep him out of the hands of any more psychos. Maybe even one that would get him home to his moms. What would Batman do?

Ok, maybe he couldn't do what Batman would do, except...

There was a thought.

...sometimes what Batman would do is, he'd call Superman.

 

\--

 

“We need to talk.”

The Riddler spun in his chair, smiling pleasantly. “What can I do for you, Ms. Savage?”

“It's about the auction.” Scandal seized the other chair and sat, playing with a knife. “I'm here to renegotiate the terms of our contract.”

“I'm afraid you can't—”

“You _hired_ us to get you people that _you_ keep. Interrogate, then kill or retain for further study.”

“And you've done so admirably, Ms.—”

“What we seem to have _gotten_ you is a valuable commodity for resale, which our contract does _not_ cover.”

Riddler watched her expectantly for a moment, to see if she was going to continue, and when he'd determined that she wasn't, said, “Your point being?”

“We get a cut of the Auction proceeds. Twenty-five percent at least.”

His expression went dark. “Out of the question.”

Scandal tossed her knife into the air and caught it by the point. “Ok, I'll say that again: we get a cut, or you don't get an auction. If you don't want to hang onto him—and I'd get that, he's annoying and he does eat a lot—then _we_ keep him. His knowledge would be an asset to the Secret Six.”

“You're welcome to bid at the—”

“Not acceptable, Riddler. This situation _isn't_ covered by our contract and it _does_ require additional compensation. We get a cut. Or we keep the kid.”

He stared at her for a moment, and then sighed. “I'll think about it.”

“Think fast. You've only got three days.”

 

\--

 

“Superman. Clark Kent. Kal-El.”

Merlin sat hunched on the desk, knees drawn up to his chest. After the Secret Six had left the previous night, he'd managed a few fitful hours of sleep and then had set to planning. He didn't know how to get out of the building, and even if he did, he was pretty sure he'd get caught again, and that wouldn't be fun. Besides, he didn't have anything to make a bow with.

It had taken him almost two hours to come up with this. He wasn't entirely clear on how powerful Superman's super-hearing was, but from what his moms had told him about the whole San Diego thing, he could probably give it a little bit of a push if he concentrated hard on how big a fan of Superman he was. Because he was, actually, a big fan of Superman. Just had to think about that. _Superman. Totally awesome. Coolest guy ever besides Batman and Green Arrow. Has super-hearing and can_ totally _hear me from wherever I am, in the middle of this creepy office building in Gotham._

“Superman. Clark Kent. Kal-El.”

Uncle Bobby had apparently managed to get Loki to hear him when Loki was in _Vanaheim_ and Bobby'd been in _prison._ Granted, they had _other_ stuff going on... _magic_ stuff...but...surely it wasn't too far from Gotham to Metropolis?

“Superman. Clark Kent. Kal-El. If you can hear me my name is Merlin Baker. I spoke to Batman and Green Arrow three days ago. I am being held hostage by the Riddler and the Secret Six. We are in an abandoned Wayne Enterprises building in Gotham City. In three days time the Riddler will be holding a Hostage Auction in an opera house in the Garment District. I have information that in the wrong hands could be dangerous to the safety of the superhero community. Ask Batman if you need confirmation. Please save me. Superman. Clark Kent. Kal-El.”

Merlin squeezed his eyes shut, and held onto his knees, and _prayed._

 

\--

 

Far away from Merlin, in another city, Superman lifted his head and listened.

 

\--

 

“You want me to do a divination in _that?_ What is it, an MRI machine?”

“Parts of it, parts of it. And there are a few parts that I cannibalized from one of Tony's car prototypes that he didn't want, and a flat-screen television, and some _fascinating_ pieces of alien technology that Sue and I picked up on our last jaunt off-world. Professor Xavier and Dr. McCoy assisted in fine-tuning part of the design, but it's mostly my own work. I suppose you would call it a _magical_ resonance imaging machine.” Reed Richards viewed the machine before them with something approaching a father's pride. “Are you _sure_ I can't take a blood sample? Just one, to assist with the tracking?”

Simon moved another two feet away from him. “If you even get near me with a needle I swear I'll scream. And anyway it wouldn't help.”

“It wouldn't?” Reed blinked. “Why not?”

“I'm adopted. Merlin and I aren't blood-related. If you want a biological tracker you'll need to get Clint off the phone with Shelly long enough to take a sample.”

“I see. But you can do it, yes? I'm very excited about this, I've never gotten a chance to observe a magical operation under proper laboratory conditions.”

“Of _course_ I can, it's just not really optimal. Or classy.” Sighing, Simon pulled off his suit jacket and hopped up onto the MRI table. “Under _optimal_ conditions I'd have a chorus of three or four women to help me with this, but Fury wouldn't even let me call one of my TAs.”

Bruce Banner looked up from the computer he was working on. “You need singers? Why do you need singers?”

“It helps focus the energy.”

“Huh.”

“Anyway.” Simon stretched out on the MRI table. “Slide the thing in. I'm going to need a few minutes to work up to a decent trance, so you might as well get all the machines going while I'm doing that.”

Reed nodded and pressed a button, and the table slid into the strange machine. A few more buttons pressed and switches flipped, and the machine and its attendant monitors whirred into life. One was a standard life signs monitor, another one monitored brain waves, and another displayed a video feed of the resonance chamber, but the others were apparently only understandable by Reed and Bruce. For his part, Bruce examined the reading on his computer screen. “Radiation's at normal levels so far.”

Faintly from inside the machine came the sound of Simon's voice. “What do you _mean,_ so far?”

“Nothing, Simon. Everything's fine.”

“It _better_ be.”

At the other end of the room sat a small group of observers, in varying states of curiousity or skepticism. Tony, being the owner of the building and the lab, was of course there, with a tablet so that he could take notes, with Steve sitting next to him. Clint sat on Steve's other side—on his phone, as Simon had said, but when he saw the machines turning on he managed a quiet send-off and put it away. Next to him was Billy Kaplan, and of course there, at the far end of the line, was Loki, sprawled in a chair with a book in hand, looking enormously unimpressed.

After a few more calibrations Reed nodded, looking pleased, and switched on the television attached to the machine. It fuzzed to life, displaying a screen full of static. “We're ready to begin whenever you are, Professor Clark.”

Simon didn't reply; on the video feed, the observers could see that he had his eyes shut, and had relaxed to the point that he almost seemed to be asleep. Reed settled into a chair of his own, watching the brain wave monitor with a look of intent fascination on his face.

For several long minutes it seemed that nothing was happening. Clint fidgeted. Billy glanced over at Loki. “Is this the kind of meditation you said wouldn't be suitable for me? It doesn't look any different from what you taught—”

One of the lines on the brain wave monitor peaked suddenly, and a sensor squealed.

Startled, everyone but Loki looked up to the video feed. Inside the machine, Simon's eyes had snapped open, and as they watched he began to shake. The movement started in his hips, a rolling motion that looked almost sexual, and then spread throughout his entire body. His back was arched, his arms twitched at his sides, and Bruce jumped to his feet. “We need to turn the machine off!”

Loki put down his book, leaning forward to catch Bruce's sleeve—the other man jerked away. “Don't turn it off now, you fool.”

“He's _seizing._ He needs medical attention.”

“Ah, the _rigors_ of Midgardian medical science, reducing so many separate events down to a single _disorder._ He's not having a _seizure,_ idiot, he's _seething._ The process is entirely different.” Looking irritated, Loki flapped a hand at the television attached to the machine. “Pay attention to your scrying device, it's working admirably.”

Sure enough, the static on the screen had cleared somewhat, and had begun to display the familiar sight of New York City, the silhouettes of Stark Tower and the Oscorp building sharp against the sky. Reed sucked in a breath. “This is _fascinating._ Much clearer than I was expecting. _Very_ exciting.”

As they watched the view on the screen moved, zipping rapidly away from the city and over the landscape until it zoomed in on a town in upstate New York. Tony leaned forward to look more closely. “Hey, that's Flashkill. You never mentioned that they'd moved, Clint.”

“Yeah, they left LA a while ago. Flashkill's apparently got a pretty good school system.”

The view on the screen zoomed in to the main square of the town, and then shifted, becoming a different, but somehow unnervingly similar town.

“This is really interesting. It's like watching one of those personal camera movies, except I'm not nauseous.” Steve leaned forward in his seat, completely engrossed as the diviner's-eye view of the town moved down a street, through a small grocery store, and out into a quiet back street. Then it shifted again, “Ok, and now, now I'm nauseous,” because the quiet back street disappeared into a swirl of stars.

Cities whipped by on the screen, tantalizing glimpses of alien worlds. In one the sky was full of flying men, in another the colors were so bright they almost blinded as laughing teens piled out of an old-fashioned drugstore with soda fountain, in a third a man with a red sword faced down a mobster who seemed to melt into the shadows surrounding him. City upon city upon city flipped by, world upon world, a dizzying array of universes. Children fought monsters, monsters fought demons, armies of teenage girls descended on small towns and fur-clad men rode lizards through decaying urban sprawl.

Then the movement slowed, the screen settling finally on an image of a vast city that seemed, in the dimming light of the day, to be a riot of architectural styles, classic Art Deco alongside ultramodern glass-and-steel. From inside the machine, Simon suddenly shouted, “Found him!”

Clint started forward in his chair. “Shit. Shit shit _shit. Fuck._ ”

Steve looked like he was about to scold, but after a lightning-fast flicker of consideration he simply said, “Clint? What's wrong? Do you recognize that place?”

“That's fucking _Gotham City!_ It's the murder capital of the multiverse! My kid is _there?_ ”

Bruce frowned. “Wait, _how_ do you recognize it?”

“That's where Batman is from.”

Bruce shook his head, but Tony understood. “Right, those comics you bring back every year after your visit. Murder capital of the multiverse? Are they really that dark?”

“Shit, Tony, Batman's Rogues Gallery is fucked _up._ ” Clint settled back into his chair, looking horrified, and began to rub at his temples.

Reed had opened a text buffer on his computer and was typing rapidly. “Can you pinpoint his location any further, Professor Clark? I'm sure that Loki and I will be able to work with the information you've already given me, but a little more precision might be nice.”

On the video feed of the resonance chamber, Simon's shaking had calmed, though he still moved restlessly. “That's all you're getting. This is _way_ longer-distance than I normally scry.”

“Well, in that case I think we have all we need.” Reed glanced over at Loki, who nodded. “I'll open the machine now, if you'd like to stop.”

The table slid out of the MRI machine, and Loki stood and stepped forward to help Simon to his feet. The other man gripped his arm tightly, swaying. “That was intense. I need food. I need _so much_ food. Is there a whole pizza anywhere nearby? And some fruit? I need water.”

Loki smiled, rather more kindly than the others had previously seen. “Of course, my dedicant. Food and water. Billy Kaplan, I require your assistance.”

As Billy and Loki helped Simon from the room, Tony moved to a cleared worktable and began to bring up the notes he'd taken on the display screens over it. Bruce and Reed gathered around him, and together the three descended into a conversation about the technical specifications of dimensional gates that the others found only barely comprehensible. Left to themselves, Steve set a hand on Clint's shoulder. “You going to be ok?”

“Shit. Gotham City. I didn't even think that place was _real._ ”

“Honestly, I don't think we can safely doubt the reality of _anything_ at this point.”

“Yeah, guess not. Well, hey, maybe I'll get to meet Batman.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up: The Hostage Auction commences (and is everything you every dreamed about that caused you to wake up terrified).
> 
>  
> 
> **Actual Explanatory Notes**
> 
>  
> 
> Seething: Simon's shaking trance is my half-accurate approximation of the ancient Norse tradition of _seidr_ , of which we have relatively few historical records. My interpretation of it is taken from the book Seidways, by Jan Fries, which I haven't finished reading yet, but it's fascinating--I highly recommend it. In regards to Billy's conversation with Loki about it, Loki views it as an unsuitable practice for Billy because seidr was often considered unclean and was typically practiced by women. Simon doesn't care especially about being seen as unclean or unmanly, whereas Billy, if nothing else, needs to be taken seriously by Thor, who might not even want to _talk_ to him if he became a _seidmadr_ (seething man). It's also not a combat form, and Billy's skill-set lends itself to combat magic, so there are practical concerns as well.
> 
> Also, extra points to people who can identify the other fictional universes Simon scrys through before he gets to Gotham! (If nobody guesses then I'll put it up on Tumblr next update.)


	6. The Hostage Auction

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The day of the Hostage Auction arrives, and it's even busier than expected. Lessons will be learned! Secret identities will be compromised! And there's just a _hint_ of Joker.

The Thorndike Opera House had long-since been abandoned by legitimate purveyors of the theatrical art, but at ten o'clock on this particular night it blazed with light and sound, and to a distant observer it might have looked like one of the “brilliant opera nights” of old. If said observer had looked any closer, however, and had _any_ sense at all, he or she would have then run very quickly in the opposite direction. Tonight the Thorndike was hosting a very different society crowd.

The parking lots near the Thorndike were filled with all manner of bizarre conveyances, most of them attended by bored-looking henchmen who drifted from vehicle to vehicle, exchanging horror stories and playing pick-up games of poker. Inside the building, the lobby was a positive mess of conflicting colors, as every costumed criminal of any name at all socialized before the Auction. Our observer previously mentioned, if he or she had _no_ good sense whatsoever, might have been able to detect the delicate stratification of the underworld: certain people forming small groups with, or scrupulously avoiding, certain other people. None of this was spoken of, of course; it all happened very naturally. It was the silent agreement among them that within the Auction building one kept to a truce. Fighting attracted unnecessary attention.

Within the crowd there was one noticeable bubble, a carefully maintained five-foot gap that nobody seemed willing to cross, around a particularly recognizable green-haired man in a garish purple suit and his motley-suited companion.

The crowds parted, and another man, just as recognizable from his television appearances as from his underworld activities, stepped into the gap and nodded politely. “Joker. Ms. Quinn. A pleasure to see you again. I didn't think you were in the market for a ransom.”

The Joker spun on his heels and grinned, offering a hand that Lex Luthor did not take. “Oh, you don't think I'd miss the Auction, do you? It's always the social event of the _season._ Besides, it's the Riddler, he only does _skills_ auctions, and those are _always_ fun.”

“I might bid, boss.” Harley Quinn waved flirtatiously at Luthor as she clung to the Joker's arm. “I've been saving up. Thought I might get you a present.”

A discreet roll of the eyes at Luthor. “Sweet. But I prefer gifts that don't have to be fed." 

She pouted. “Oh, right. I hadn't thought of that.” 

“You never do.”

A large man, with neatly trimmed beard and expensive dark suit, cut into the Joker's bubble of space and nodded to both him and Luthor. “Good evening.”

Another spin, another proferred and ignored hand. “Why, it's the caveman!”

Luthor nodded shortly. “Savage. It's been some time.”

“Yes. I imagine to you it would be.” Vandal Savage shot him a dark look. “I had heard my daughter might be present. I believe Riddler has retained her and her ridiculous friends to guard his stock.”

As they talked, the four super-criminals began to drift toward the staircase up to the boxes. Luthor adjusted his cufflinks. “Fascinating. Whoever it is must be valuable if he's willing to pay their prices.”

“We'll see soon enough.”

They reached the first box, and Lex Luthor held open the door for the other three to walk through sideways, none of them willing to present their backs to the others. He also locked the door behind them, and together the four of them took their seats side by side, so that nobody had quite enough room to try anything. Below them the rest of the theater filled up with criminals, and Harley chattered pleasantly about who was feeling audacious enough to take the other boxes as Joker, Luthor, and Vandal Savage sized each other up.

“You know, Luthor,” said Savage finally, “You haven't quite seemed yourself lately. Something going wrong with your experiments?”

Luthor smiled faintly. “I'm sure I don't know what you mean.”

“Oh, shut up, you two.” Joker leaned forward to rest his elbows on the edge of the box, gazing with interest at the figures beginning to emerge on the stage. “It's starting.” 

\--

Floyd scanned the crowd as he and his teammates walked on-stage, hauling their cargo behind them. The kid had been tied securely to a chair, his hands separated so that he couldn't try to _shoot_ any of them, and under the sheet that concealed him he was making little noises of such terror that Floyd almost felt sorry for him. The turnout for the Auction was pretty impressive, though; it hadn't been this crowded since Deathstroke had offered a marathon ten-lot Auction of children of popular senators four years ago. 

Riddler followed along behind them, fussing like they were actually setting up some kind of show, making them move the kid's chair this way and that and reposition themselves until he was satisfied that they were getting the best view. Then he ran off again to make sure that the insane sound system his goons had built was functioning, and left Floyd and his friends alone on stage with the kid.

“Hey. Blake.” He elbowed Blake lightly in the ribs. “Get a load of this.”

Blake followed his line of sight down to a spot in the audience. Poison Ivy was seated near one of the aisles, her arm around Cheshire's shoulders. As the two men watched, Ivy leaned over to whisper something in the other woman's ear, reaching to cover Cheshire's hand on the armrest with her own. Cheshire laughed. Blake shuddered. “I don't know if what I'm feeling right now is arousal or a panic attack.” 

Behind him Scandal snorted derisively. “Both of you are pigs.”

“Oh, c'mon, sis, don't tell me that doesn't get you a little tingly on the inside.”

“Ivy's ok, but I try to make a point of not sleeping with women whose bodily fluids are poisonous.”

“Man, you and redheads.”

“Shut up, all of you.” Riddler was back, adjusting the microphone on the lapel of his jacket. “It's time to get started.”

\--

The talking in the audience dropped to a murmur as Riddler ran out onto the stage, adjusted his microphone, and then flung his arms wide in greeting, gesturing to the audience with his cane. “Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to my auction!”

The crowd rumbled, a mix of greetings, curses, and jeers.

“Yeah, I'm happy to see you too. I'd rather you were in front of me than behind me.”

Many people laughed. Many more looked angry.

“Anyway, I have to say I'm impressed. Haven't seen a crowd like this in ages, and anyone here who really knows me knows that I love a good audience.” 

From near the back of the room, Giganta expanded slightly and shouted, “Get on with it!” 

He beamed at her. “Of course. Let's get this show on the road. Ms. Savage, if you would be so kind?”

Scandal rolled her eyes, flipped him off—“You're always so friendly, Ms. Savage.”—and whipped off the sheet covering the auction lot to reveal...a teenage boy, dressed in a battered hoodie and jeans, and looking absolutely terrified.

Someone shouted, “That's _it?_ ” 

“Oh, please, I haven't even gotten started.” Riddler bowed mockingly to the audience, hand over his heart. “ _Anyway._ Our lot at tonight's auction is the only boomer I've found or heard of who's even _remotely_ interesting. He's a crack shot, according to my contractors—”

Catman gestured to the bandage still obscuring his vision.

“—although we can't really demonstrate that without giving him a weapon. More importantly, though, this kid is a _fountain_ of useful information. He knows some really _fascinating_ secrets—about me, and you, and everyone else we know. _Particularly_ our old friends in the superhero community.” He paused for a long, dramatic moment to let that sink in, smiling as he heard people start to whisper. “Let's start the bidding at thirty thousand dollars, people. And don't embarrass yourselves.”

He was met with a long, whispered-filled lack of response.

“Oh, come _on,_ people. I'm doing you a favor making this sale. I could just be charging per question.”

Somewhere near the middle of the crowd, Mirror Master shouted, “How do we know his information is useful to us?”

Riddler sighed. “Ok, ok. Testing the merchandise. Give him a mic.” A goon ran out on stage and clipped a microphone to the kid's shirt, then disappeared back into the wings. “Kid, what's the real name of the Huntress?”

The kid stared at him, biting his lip, and shook his head.

“Come on, kid. Speak up.” No answer. “Mr. Blake? I believe you made a remark earlier about fingertips?”

The kid's eyes went wide. “He-helena Bertinelli. The Huntress' real name is Helena Bertinelli.”

There were noises in the crowd, and then from the edge of the front row, the Penguin raised his umbrella and shouted, “Thirty-five thousand dollars.”

Riddler used the head of his cane to tip his hat back out of his eyes. “That's it? That's all? Really? Kid, how do you stop a Green Lantern?”

The crowd murmured, and the kid closed his eyes for a moment as if deep in thought and then said, “Disrupt concentration. Immobilize. Steal their ring or power battery.”

Black Mask raised a hand and shouted, “Fifteen shards of kryptonite.”

“What would I do with kryptonite? Kid, what's the upper limit of the Flash's speed?" 

The kid opened his mouth, paused, and then looked up at the Riddler, squinting in the stage lights. “Which one?”

The question in itself caused more of a commotion in the crowd, and the Riddler shrugged. “Which one do you know?”

“All four.”

Gorilla Grodd leaned out from one of the boxes and bellowed, “Thailand.”

Riddler grinned. “Now we're talking.”

After that, the dam had broken, and the bids started coming in thick and fast. Bidding on any Hostage Auction was as much a matter of offering something the bidder was interested in as of beating out the other contenders—here, even Killer Moth could outbid Lex Luthor if he had something interesting to trade.

“We've got a time machine, enough energy for one round trip.” The Flash's Rogues, with Captain Cold at their head.

“A vintage Enigma machine, in full working order.” Captain Nazi, sneering down at the other criminals around him.

“Flight.” Dr. Sivana, hunched in the sixth row with his beautiful wife on his arm.

Next to Sivana, Dr. T.O. Morrow grinned and waved. “Here's an offer with symmetry. I'll let you meet yourself from any point in the future and you can spend the day together.”

Riddler tapped his chin. “Tempting, tempting.”

“I'll tempt you, little man.” The audience turned to look at Cheetah. “How about a night with me?”

“Cute.” Riddler pretended to think about it. “No.”

“I always knew you were gay!”

“Oswald Cobblepot, everyone. What a class act.”

The offers piled up—money, gems, political positions, interesting magical artifacts and pieces of future tech—and then began to slow. Riddler was pleased, almost gleeful, and he paced on the stage like a showman. “We're slowing down and I haven't heard any _really_ interesting offers yet.” He pondered for a moment, looking over the audience. “Why not go a little closer to home? Kid.”

The kid looked up, waiting for the question, and the crowd fell briefly silent.

“What's the name of Cheshire's daughter?”

In the seats Cheshire started to her feet, and as the kid opened his mouth to answer he was cut off by the somehow resounding snap of a cell phone being closed in one of the boxes. Talia al'Ghul leaned out over the wall of her box and said, in a voice that was quiet but carried, “My father has authorized me to offer you one hundred years access to a Lazarus pit on his behalf.” The rest of the audience began to talk, and she shook her head. “For my own bid, I can offer you the position of High Comptroller of Leviathan.”

Riddler shook his head. “You're not really exiciting me here, princess. Any other takers?”

Lady Vic adjusted her goggles and said, “One assassination.”

Across the hall and in the front row, Deathstroke glanced over at her, looked up at the stage, and said, “Hey, kid.”

The kid looked down at the audience, saw who was addressing him, and swallowed hard. “Y-yes?”

“What do you shoot?”

“Compound bow. Longbow. Recurved bow. Hunting rifle, once.”

“Tiny-ass paperclip and rubber band bow, with a pencil,” added Deadshot, jerking his thumb at Catman's bandaged face.

Deathstroke nodded, and then said, “ _Three_ assassinations. And one permanent maiming.”

Several seats down from him, the Calculator adjusted his glasses and said, “Eighty thousand dollars and a year's free use of my services.”

The Riddler leaned forward to peer at him. “Calc. You _never_ bid. I'll admit, that is tempting. Hm, something interesting, something interesting...kid, you know the names of Superman's birth parents?”

At this point the kid was breathing shallowly, and under the lights he'd flushed and seemed to be sweating. He looked petrified. “Jor-El. His father was Jor-El, and his mother was Lara. Of the House of El." 

“Five million dollars.”

Everyone in the audience looked up at the shadowed first box. Lex Luthor was leaning forward in his chair, eyes burning.

“And I'll owe you a favor.”

Absolute silence, and then the Riddler clapped slowly. “When's the last time you even deigned to _bid_ on an Auction? And that's an offer I can hardly refuse. So. Going once to Mr. Luthor, for five million dollars and a favor. Anyone else? More bids?”

Nobody spoke.

“Going twice, Lex Luthor, five mil and a favor.”

Nothing. 

“Going three times. Kid? Any last tidbits to drum up interest? Tell me something I don't know.”

The gaze of the audience returned to the stage, all eyes fixed on the kid, who took a shaky breath and then started to laugh, a long, strung-out, panicky laugh, tears streaming from his eyes. “You, you really want to know something new? Well, I'm screwed anyway, so. The Joker.”

There was a collective drawing in of breath.

“I know where the Joker's from. I know how to _make_ one.” 

The clatter of a chair being knocked over echoed around the room, and everyone looked up at the first box again.

The Joker had stood, towering above his companions. “Anything you want, Riddler.”

The Riddler's eyebrows shot up. “Anything? What if what I want is five million dollars and a favor from Lex Luthor?”

“Anything. You. Want.”

Those who were watching the stage saw the blood drain from the kid's face. The Riddler sucked in a deep breath and then smiled so wide that it looked like his face would split. “Well. Well well well. We have, ladies and gentlemen, the most groundbreaking offer in Auction history. Sold, to the Joker, for anything I want!”

\--

The Riddler ran off stage to go negotiate terms with the Joker, the audience erupted into conversation, and the Secret Six were left to get the actual auction lot off stage. As they dragged boy and chair into the wings, Scandal said, “Well, I think that went better than expected.”

“Oh god I'm going to die.”

“Truly?” Bane looked down at her with an inquisitive tilt of the head. “I would not wish such a fate on any child.”

“Me neither.” Floyd lit a cigarette. “I knew a guy once, lived _next_ to where the Joker had shacked up. Practically lived on No-Doz because of the nightmares.”

“...I pissed off the Joker, I made him mad, I'm going to die, oh god oh god oh god...”

“Seriously,” said Blake. “Nobody deserves the Joker.”

They'd reached what used to be a dressing room, and the chair got set down against one wall. The kid was still babbling, but nobody was really paying attention to him. Scandal pulled down her mask and grinned viciously. “Exactly. That's why Joker's not getting him.”

Jeannette raised an eyebrow. “I assume you have a plan, my dear?”

“...never been to Brazil. Never finished _Lord of the Rings._ Never eaten squid. I'm going to die and I've never eaten squid!”

“Of course. Riddler already screwed us over by ducking out of the negotiation for our cut of the Auction proceeds. Since he's not giving us a cut, I have to assume that he instead picked the other option I gave him, which means that the kid is ours.”

“So you're saying...”

“...oh god I'm going to die a virgin, it's like a horror movie...”

“We take the money and run. We could triple our fees if we had access to the stuff this kid knows, and embarassing our employer in front of the Joker is an ideal object lesson.”

_“You know, I think I like this plan a lot.”_

“So do I.” Jeannette had paused to fix her hair. “I don't like our employer's attitude.”

Floyd shrugged. “Can't really make our rep any worse than it is. Right, Blake?”

“Hm. Right. And I like the idea of giving Joker a black eye.”

“...never even kissed anyone, really. No guy kisses. No girl kisses. At this point I'd be cool with _squid_ kisses...”

“Well, hey then, death wishes all around.”

Bane rumbled thoughtfully. “Normally I do not approve of breaking contracts, but our employer has not dealt fairly with us. I agree to this plan.” 

“Good.” Scandal nodded and pulled her mask back up. “So it's decided. Now we've just got to get him out of here.”

Together they looked over at the kid, who was staring sightlessly at the wall, pupils dilated massively. He was still talking. “I _almost_ kissed that girl from the Estonian rhythmic gymnastics team but then her coach caught us. Can't even evade authority figures. How pathetic is that? I'm almost seventeen and I've never kissed _anyone._ Is there an afterlife? Will it count if I kiss someone in the afterlife? Maybe if I...”

Floyd crushed the butt of his cigarette against a wall. “If he keeps going like that he's gonna attract a lot of attention we don't need. You got any more chloroform, Jeannette?” 

“It's not as if I carry a regular supply, dear shootist. Normally I don't need it.”

Ragdoll raised a hand. _“I could make him faint.”_

“...should have taken Jason up on his offer freshman year, I did hear he was a good kisser...”

“Don't,” said Scandal. “We don't want to risk brain damage. No point in stealing the kid if he can't tell us anything.”

_“I don't see you offering us a useful alternative, Scandal, unless you plan to smother him with your commanding presence.”_

They began to argue. The kid continued to babble. Blake and Bane stared at the others, and Bane said, quietly, “I have nothing substantial to offer this discussion. I am not usually a taker of hostages.”

Blake looked up at him, over at the babbling kid, and back at his bickering teammates, and then let out a long sigh. “It's like none of them were ever teenagers. And yet again I take one for the team.” Calmly, he reached over and seized the front of the kid's shirt. “I want you to understand that, all right, kid? This is for the _team._ Don't read anything into it.”

“It's terrible, right? It's pathetic. It's like my entire life has been opporunities to kiss people and I've just—mmph!”

The other members of the Six turned to stare, and after a moment Floyd said, “Whoa there. Now that's...that is men kissing, right there.”

_“You must admit, Floyd, it's a novel solution to our problem.”_

Blake pulled back and let go of the kid's shirt. “Better?”

Silence.

“Kid?”

“...I am suddenly at peace with my impending demise.”

“Good. Now can it. If you shut up you might actually live through this.”

“Shutting up now.” 

“Good plan.” Blake looked over at the others. “Now. Is anyone going to mention this ever again?”

The others shook their heads silently.

“Then let's get a move on.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Good lord. I forgot the bump.
> 
> Next up: Rescue ahoy!
> 
> List of other worlds seen in the divination will be up on Tumblr this evening after I get off work.


	7. The Rescuers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rescue arrives for Merlin, and justice for the Auction attendees, and Marvel finally reaches the DCU!

There was a lot of noise in the front half of the building and outside, but the Secret Six weren't paying attention. For the most part they were concerned with navigating the back ways of the Thorndike unseen, and preferably with getting out of the building before either Riddler or Joker noticed that they'd run off with the auction lot. It wasn't a long way to the exit, comparatively speaking, but taking the halls that left them unseen meant that they made a lot of obscure turns and occasionally had to double back. Their cargo remained blessedly silent. He still looked stunned.

Rounding a corner near the exit they saw a flash of green, and everyone moved back until they realized that it wasn't Riddler or Joker, but Cheshire, apparently making for the same exit door. She looked them over, eyes lingering on the young man Bane carried. “Old friends.”

“Jade.” Scandal's eyes were steely.

“Making off with the merchandise, I see.” Cheshire cracked her knuckles. “Does he _actually_ know my daughter's name?”

They glanced at Merlin, who said, breathlessly, “I used to. I actually can't remember now.”

“Good. Keep not remembering.” Then she smiled faintly, meeting Catman's eyes. “Thomas.”

He nodded, not saying anything.

“It's messy out there. Be careful.” And she darted down the exit hallway and was gone.

After a moment they went down another hallway and paused before the door on the loading door to listen. Outside, they could hear shouts, screams, and the crashing of battle. Jeannette made a _moue_ of discontent. “Lovely. We've been tracked. Where did you park the van, my dear?”

“Right at the bottom of the dock ramp.” Scandal opened the door a crack to peer out. “It looks clear so far.”

“Good.” Blake shot a glance at their cargo. “Stop staring at me, kid, you're not my type.”

Merlin blushed vividly. “What...what _is_ your type?”

“Bigger, better at fighting, and old enough to vote. At _least._ ”

“Man, Blake, we're just learning all _kinds_ of stuff about you tonight.” Floyd dug around in his pockets for a cigarette. “Stuff I did _not_ need to know. Anyway, here goes nothing. Let's do this.”

Everyone took a deep breath, and then Bane pushed open the door.

 

\--

 

The night air was chilly on Merlin's face, and he wasn't sure if it was because they were near the waterfront, or if it was a different time of year here than it was back home, or if it was because his cheeks were still burning. He was starting to get used to hanging upside down over someone's shoulder, at least, but there was still the...the... _Catman._ Maybe he wasn't going to have to turn in his nerd card after all.

_Bigger...better fighter...oh my god I bet he_ does _like Deadshot. That's...is that hot? Yeah, ok, that's totally hot._ Up until tonight Merlin had known he liked men in the same way that he knew he liked Brazil—everything was very exciting to think about, but until he actually managed to get there it was all pretty theoretical. He _knew_ he liked women, in the same way that he knew he liked Paris—no practical experience again, but he'd gotten close enough to know he was definitely enthusiastic. _So I'm definitely bi. At least that's cleared up. If I die I'll at least die knowing something about myself._

He was getting dizzy again. Dimly he could hear the Six arguing about something, and he felt the rumble in his bones as Bane said, “The first person to suggest surrender, I will use _as_ a weapon.”

Merlin wondered, briefly, about the possibility of Bane and Scandal doing a Fastball Special. She _did_ have the claws, after all. They didn't have a Sentinel robot to fight, though, so it wasn't really relevant.

_“I thought_ you _were supposed to be the tactical genius. If we're not surrendering, how do you propose we get out of this situation intact?”_

“We have accomplished our primary goal in this plan by removing the boy from the Riddler's possession and preventing the Joker from gaining access to him. I propose that we use him as a diversion to effect our escape.”

_“And how do you propose we do that? Do you suppose he knows a little dance? I suppose_ I _could do a little dance, but I don't much fancy being arrested.”_

Then, suddenly, Merlin was being lifted off Bane's shoulder, and for a moment he was looking Bane straight in the eyes. The vast mercenary nodded solemnly to him. “Perhaps we will meet again, child. If you live.”

And then Fastball Specials were _very_ relevant, because Bane _threw_ him.

He was in the air, he was weightless, he was out of breath with the feeling of it because for a moment it felt like he'd be able to fly if only he could twist around to get his arms out properly. Then the moment passed, and there was a dreadful sensation of falling. _So this is it. This is how I die._

_Thump._

Heat.

He hadn't landed. He'd been _caught._ Someone was holding him, cradled like a child against an enormously broad chest. Whoever it was radiated heat, not painfully but pleasantly so, like an electric blanket. He gasped spasmodically. “Oh, oh god, I'm, I'm not dead. I'm not dead? I'm not dead!”

The person carrying him chuckled, kindly, the laughter shaking into his bones, and somehow it was warm too. Below them Merlin heard someone else shout, “Hey, Supes! We got Luthor! He's a _robot!_ ”

“I'll be there in a minute, Flash.”

The implications of _that_ response, coming from the person who was carrying him, came crashing slowly in on Merlin's already exhausted brain. He rubbed his eyes, as if that would help them adjust to the lamp-lit night, and looked up at his savior.

Above him in the darkness he saw blue eyes, and dark hair, and a kind smile full of gleaming white teeth. “I'm sorry we had to take so long, Merlin. You're safe now.”

Merlin stared at him. “You _heard_ me.”

“Of course I did,” said Superman. “You needed my help.”

 

\--

 

Helena Bertinelli was in a rage. She was livid. She was _furious_ as she charged towards the Watchtower infirmary, barely taking a moment to knock before she burst in and hissed, “Ok, _where's_ the little shit who compromised my identity to two-thirds of the world's costumed hoods?”

“Will you keep it down? He's sleeping.”

Startled, she looked around for who had spoken to her. “Connor? What are you doing here?”

Connor Hawke made a face at her from where he sat in a chair next to the rescuee's bed. “I'm sitting with him. He started having a panic attack while they were rounding everyone up because he spotted Harley Quinn and thought the Joker was going to find him and kill him. Kid's had a rough week.”

Helena scowled even as she rounded the bed and pulled up a chair on the other side. “None of the _other_ teenagers I know would fold that fast.”

He sighed. “Huntress, most of the teenagers you know are already in tights. Cut him some slack.”

“I hadn't thought of that.” She gazed down at the sleeping boy, who looked very small in the set of pajamas someone had found for him, and sniffed the air. “Strawberries? Did...did he use Power Girl's shampoo?” Glancing around, she picked up what looked like a pack of cards from the bedside table. “And what's this?”

“It's a little foldout computer tablet. Only thing the Six didn't take off him; I don't think they knew what it was. He was showing me pictures on it earlier.”

“Pictures of what?”

“Family photos. Him, his moms, his aunts and uncles and cousins. Couple shots of his dad, who's from _another_ universe, so that explanation got a little confusing. His Halloween costumes.” Connor smiled, looking slightly bemused. “He's gone as a different fictional archer for Halloween every year since he was four. Three years ago he went as _me._ ”

She frowned. “How are you fictional?”

“Apparently we're all comic book characters where he's from. His cousin went as you.”

That was not what she'd been expecting to hear. She frowned harder, trying to process the idea of people wanting to read comics about her.

In the bed the kid rolled over, mumbling something, and then opened his eyes slowly, gaze locking onto her face. She tried for a smile, although she wasn't sure it was coming out very sincere. “Hey there, Coppertop. How're you feeling?”

He stared at her for a long second before stammering out, “I-I have kissed the lips that kissed you!”

“What?” She parsed the sentence, thought about where he'd been in the past week, and, “Oh my god, you kissed _Thomas?_ ” On the other side of the bed Connor covered his mouth, obviously trying not to laugh. “What were you doing kissing him? What was _he_ doing kissing _you?_ You're not even old enough to vote!”

“It was an emergency.” Then his face crumpled in distress. “I'm sorry I told everyone your name. I didn't know what else to do.”

“Well, I can't say I'm—hey, hey, don't cry, kid, I'm _not_ mad at you.” Awkwardly she tugged him up into a hug, patting his shoulder and trying to project comforting thoughts. “You did what you had to do. You were trying to stay alive.” Over the top of his head she shot a pleading look at Connor— _help me out here!_ “So you know my name—what's yours?”

“Merlin Baker,” he said, voice muffled by tears and her shoulder.

“Merlin? Are you—”

“ _Not_ related to Merlyn the Magnificent.” Connor winked at her, grinning. “It's just a weird coincidence.”

“Everyone keeps asking me about that. Just because I wear purple and shoot a bow doesn't mean I'm _him._ ” Merlin pulled away from her and wiped his face on his sleeve. “Crap, sorry, I cried on your outfit.”

She laughed in spite of herself. “Kid, I've washed so many bloodstains out of this thing, a little bit of salt water isn't going to do it any harm. So you're an archer? Like Zen Boy here, or do you do crossbows?”

“Standard. Crossbows scare me. I just got an Olympic gold, like, three weeks ago, but nobody wants to hear about that here. It's all been horrible stuff happening and trying not to tell anyone Batman's real name. Did you know that the Riddler doesn't eat anything besides granola and tuna steaks?”

“I hadn't heard that—”

Their conversation was interrupted by the shriek of alarms, and a light above the exit door began to strobe red. Merlin tumbled out of the bed and to his feet. “What's that? Is it...do you have fire drills here? You're floating in space, how does that work?”

Connor frowned. “That's actually not one of the normal alarms. Here, hang on a second.” He dug his communicator out of his pocket. “Manhunter? What's going on?”

The alarms died abruptly, and over the communicator a deep voice said, “Connor? Is the young man awake?”

“Yeah, he just woke up a few minutes ago.” Connor's frown deepened. “What's wrong?”

“That was a breach alarm. We've just apprehended a dimension-hopper who claims to be his uncle. Could you bring him to the command room, please?”

“Uh...sure. Give us a few minutes so he can get changed and we'll be right up.”

 

\--

 

When Connor, Merlin, and Helena reached the command room, they saw that a group of heroes were crowded around Jon Stewart, who was projecting a green bubble and looking fairly unamused. The bubble contained a masked man in a tuxedo and bright green boots, and just outside its sphere was a glowing doorway, anchored in one of the room's support pillars. The masked man had his arms crossed over his chest and was tapping his foot impatiently. “Look, you have _no_ idea how much power it's taking to power that thing. If I'm not back to check in with them in ten minutes you're going to get a _lot_ more visitors—”

Merlin stopped short at the edge of the group, staring. “Holy shit. Uncle Bobby?”

The masked man whipped around. “Merlin! You're alive!”

A hand came down on Merlin's shoulder, and he looked up, startled, to find that the _Martian Manhunter_ was standing right next to him. “You know this man, child?”

Merlin nodded, momentarily dumbstruck before he managed, “Yeah. That's my uncle.”

The Manhunter nodded shortly at Jon Stewart, who dropped the bubble and rubbed at his ring hand. Freed, the erstwhile prisoner charged into Merlin, seizing him in a bone-breaking hug. “Shit, kid, you had us all worried sick. It took us _ages_ to find you; this dimensional neighborhood is an absolute clusterfuck. I almost got toasted by a Communist Superman. Did _you_ know there was a Communist Superman? What _happened_ to you?”

“I...I got sucked through a boom tube and kidnapped by supervillains and almost sold to the Joker and then Superman saved me.”

In response, a low whistle. “Shit. Bad times. Anyway, maybe you should introduce me to your super-friends before they arrest me.”

“Why _did_ you come in costume?”

“I'll have you know that this tux can stop bullets. Seriously, though, I don't _know_ most of these people, and they're looking at me like I'm some kind of supervillain. Use Simon, not Bobby, nobody takes me seriously when I'm Bobby.”

Merlin lowered his voice long enough to mutter, “You _are_ a supervillain,” before pulling out of his uncle's embrace and straightening up. “So. Uh. Members of the Justice League, this is my uncle, Professor Simon Clark.”

Green Arrow elbowed his way through the crowd and looked Simon up and down, snorting. “Professor? Of _what?_ ”

“Theology, Mr...Arrow, I presume?” Simon held out a hand, grinning whitely through his multi-colored mask. “Not that I wear this outfit when I'm teaching, of course. _These_ are my priestly vestments.”

“Ok, I'm provisionally willing to accept that you're a professor, but you _cannot_ tell me that you're a priest.” Green Arrow shook hands with Simon, though his frown suggested that he found it somewhat distasteful.

“Actually, I'm not just a priest, I'm a major religious leader. Although the warrants out for my arrest do make public speaking engagements a little difficult.”

Nearby, Mr. Terrific, the Atom, and several other scientists had gathered around the dimensional gate and were examining it with some interest. As Merlin launched into a brief and halting explanation of his uncle's status as the high priest of a chaos god, they began rummaging around for pieces of analytical equipment. The readouts around the edges of the portal continued to blink cheerfully, and then, suddenly, blazed red.

The scientists jumped back, and Mr. Terrific scowled. “More visitors?”

Simon turned to look at the gate. “Shit. Need to make my safe call or else there'll be a _lot_ more superheroes in the room.”

“Maybe that's not such a bad idea.”

Startled, everyone turned to see Batman, suddenly standing behind the group, flanked by Wonder Woman and Superman. All three looked grave; Batman looked almost thunderous.

“We've been talking to some of the criminals we took into custody,” said Wonder Woman, running her lasso through her hands absently. “There were some disturbing revelations about what Lex Luthor's been up to lately. This may be more serious than we thought.”

“Your people have more experience with interdimensional travel than we do.” Batman nodded to Simon. “We would appreciate their assistance.”

“And their friendship.” Superman stepped forward and held out a massive hand to Simon, who took it, looking as if he was trying not to be awed. “It's nice to meet you, Professor Clark. Would you please invite your friends to join us?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up: The crossover event of the season begins!
> 
> **Actual End Notes**
> 
> The list of other worlds seen in the scrying session two chapters ago is now up on Tumblr [here](http://dangerouscommiesubversive.tumblr.com/post/35384844362/worlds-enough-other-fictional-universes). I can't imagine the DC multiverse being at all easy to navigate, seeing as there are 52 different places to get through--thus Simon having to pop in and out of a bunch of different places.


	8. I Was A Teenage MacGuffin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The initial visiting party of Avengers arrives at the Watchtower, and introductions are made.

The initial interdimensional visiting party consisted of Captain America, Iron Man, and Captain Marvel, the last of whom was fairly pleased about finally having the chance to dimension-hop after hearing her colleagues talk about it for years. Billy Kaplan had been firmly dissuaded from coming, primarily by Loki glaring at him when he tried to argue with Steve. “I'm already risking _one_ of the two people on this benighted plane that I can actually stand to talk to.”

“But I—”

“ _Frog,_ Billy Kaplan.”

“Hey, you're not supposed to threaten to turn me into a frog anymore!”

“And when have I ever done what I'm supposed to do?”

Steve shook his head, sighing. “Why is it that your orders have more weight with him than mine?”

“ _I_ can turn him into a frog.”

Then it became the problem of Reed trying to argue that he should be coming along for the initial visit, as the one most experienced with interdimensional travel. That they dealt with by pointing out that he needed to stay in the lab to monitor the gate and they'd call him and the others as soon as they'd determined it was safe. He wasn't happy about it, but honestly over the years he'd had to adjust to a lot of disappointments when working with the Avengers—they were less tolerant than his own team when it came to getting distracted taking soil samples or scrutinizing native fauna.

Clint, however, was less easily dissuaded. When they'd suited up and gotten to the gate they found that he was already there, in uniform and waiting. Steve started to speak, but the archer shook his head. “Look, I may only see him once a year, but he's _still_ my kid. If you're going through there, you're taking me with you.”

“He's got a point there, Rogers,” said Danvers, hitching up her sash to sit more comfortably on her hip. “And even if you say no I suspect he'll come anyway. Right, Barton?”

“Damn straight.”

Steve rubbed at his temples. “Why is nobody listening to me today?”

“It's because we know that secretly you're a fluffy teddy bear.” Tony patted him lightly on the shoulder. “It's ok, it's nothing to be ashamed of. We getting a move on, or what?”

So nobody was listening to him. He guessed that he could live with it, just this once. “Is the gate up and running, Dr. Richards?”

“Of course it is, of course it is. You can go through at any time. Go right ahead.”

Steve stepped through the gate and was surprised to feel an electric crackle that he didn't remember from previous trips between worlds. It was as if, somehow, he was being stretched farther than he had before, leaping across distances previously uncrossed. It wasn't painful, but it was certainly unexpected, and he shuddered before taking in his surroundings.

This, Simon had told him, was the control room of the Justice League's home base. The ceiling of the room was high above his head, and he was surrounded by computers. It looked more like the set of one of the science fiction movies Tony liked than like any superhero base he'd ever been in; even the Inifinite Mansion, while occasionally pretty weird, still mostly looked like a house. That Cable fellow had a spaceship, but then again he was also _from_ the future, so that didn't really count.

The welcoming committee looked more like something he was used to, though—he'd come face to face with a group of men and women in costumes with wary looks on their faces. The only ones who didn't look suspicious and distrusful were the three in front, one of whom Steve vaguely recognized from the comic books Clint was always bringing home from Shelly's world.

He adjusted his helmet and held up a hand in greeting, summoning his best for-the-public smile. “Hi, you must be the Justice League. Are we, ah, doing codenames or can I just give you my real name?”

“Let's keep this professional for now. We all have people we want to protect.” An enormous man—not the biggest man Steve had ever seen, but pretty close—held out his hand and smiled warmly. “I'm Superman.”

“Captain America. Leader of the Avengers. It's a pleasure to meet you, Superman.” Steve shook hands, surprised to find that Superman's hand genuinely dwarfed his. A clinking sound behind him alerted him to the arrival of the others through the gate—Tony's suit always made that noise on metal floors. “And these are some of my teammates, Iron Man, Captain Marvel, and Hawkeye.”

Tony waved. “I like your spaceship here. Very _Star Trek._ ”

“Ah...thank you?” Superman offered his hand to Tony, who shook, and Steve knew _exactly_ how much he was grinning behind the faceplate of his helmet.

The woman next to Superman was looking Danvers over. “You're Captain Marvel?”

Danvers nodded sharply. “That I am, ma'am. I used to be Ms. Marvel, but I don't see why the boys should get to have all the fun with titles.”

“I agree. I'm Wonder Woman.”

That got a grin as the two women shook hands. “Wonder Woman?”

Wonder Woman nodded, smiling faintly. “It's a hereditary title. Makes it a little hard on my kid sister, though; she has to be Wonder Girl. Anyway, we have a Captain Marvel too. Male, though.”

“That's going to make things a little confusing.”

“Not really. He's not around too much. And if he does show up he's a pretty accomodating guy; I'm sure we'd work something out.”

Clint, meanwhile, had stepped around Steve to shake Batman's hand enthusiastically. “I have to say, man, I'm a _big_ fan of your work. The boo, grr, whole scaring the crap out of people thing, it's way cool. I'm normally not close enough to people to scare them.”

Batman didn't blink, not exactly, but his eyes flickered behind his mask in a way that suggested he hadn't been expecting to hear that. “Thank you. You're Hawkeye?”

“The one, the only, for this limited one-week engagement, the Incredible Hawkeye, world's greatest marksman. That's me.” Clint grinned. “Not that I'm bragging or anything.”

“World's greatest marksman, huh?” The others in the welcoming party stepped aside to let through someone who Steve could only think of as Errol Flynn's unexpectedly muscular grandson. “I'll fight you for that title. Green Arrow, by the way. As long as Supes has us doing this whole cross-dimensional buddy-buddy business, why don't we test that theory?”

Superman raised a hand like he was about to scold, or at least comment, but Clint beat him to the punch with, “You're on. First, though, _where's_ my son?”

Another flicker from Batman. “ _Your_ son?”

Bare feet pounded across the floor, the welcoming party of costumed heroes (now mostly occupied with the meet-and-greet, which Steve figured could take all night) shifted to the side again, and a red-haired rocket collided with Clint at what Steve figured might have been top speed for a baseline human. He'd only seen Merlin in photos before, but there were a _lot_ of photos—Clint didn't have much blood family, so he cherished what he'd got. Clint stumbled back, laughing in a way that stank of relief. “Holy shit, wizard, when did you grow two inches?”

“Right after your last visit. I made all your photos out-of-date.” Apart from the red hair, the resemblance was a little startling.

Steve heard a quiet laugh, and turned to see that Superman was also watching the reunion and smiling. “That's a determined young man, there. He called me when he needed help, you know.”

Steve blinked. “Really? How?”

“Super-hearing.” Superman tapped one ear. “It's more a burden than anything, but sometimes it comes in handy.”

“I know how that goes. I don't have super-hearing, but not aging isn't all it's cracked up to be sometimes.”

“I imagine not. So, your team...”

“The Avengers.”

“Yes. The Avengers.” Superman paused, pondering. “The name suggests some philosophical differences.”

“We didn't pick it. It was...thrust upon us, I suppose you'd say. We do what we can to rise above it.”

“I see.” Another pause, and then, tentatively, “The boy's uncle...is _he...?_ ”

The idea, the _image_ made Steve laugh. “Bob—Simon? An Avenger? Oh, no, no, he's...he normally goes by _Discord_ when he's costume.”

“He's a criminal?” Superman frowned. “I thought he said he was a priest.”

“He is. The problem is more who he's a priest _of._ You don't have a Loki around these parts, do you?”

“The Norse god of mischief?” Steve jumped—Batman had come over to join the conversation without making a sound. Behind him, Tony had gotten drawn into a conversation with several scientist types about the construction of the gate, and Danvers and Wonder Woman were trading war stories in the company of a growing crowd of other costumed women. “I believe we have one, but not in an...active capacity.”

“He's a supervillain where we're from. One of the worst, actually. The only reason he and Simon are in on this rescue at all is because Simon's Merlin's uncle and Loki has the raw power to _get_ us here, and you wouldn't _believe_ what we had to promise him to get him to agree to help.” A sudden, horrible thought occurred to him. “Where _is_ Simon, anyway?”

Superman glanced over at Batman, who said, “Huntress took him down to the cafeteria to get something for his nephew to eat. I wouldn't have let them leave if I thought he was an actual threat. Are you saying that he is?”

Steve grimaced. “Not _mostly,_ he's generally remarkably _non-_ threatening for a powered criminal. High collateral damage, but he almost never _means_ to hurt anyone.”

“Almost?”

“There have been incidents. Generally when Loki is in a bad mood. I'm just worried that he might start trying to talk to your teammates about religion.”

Batman and Superman shared a glance, and Superman nodded slowly. “Is that bad?”

“He gets _very_ convincing, and Loki doesn't need any more super-powered fans than he's already got. I wouldn't want Simon causing you folks any trouble.”

 

\--

 

In the end they had to haul Simon away from his impromptu sermon in the cafeteria—“Hey, I can't help it if I feel the divine urge!”—and Batman escorted most of the teen sidekicks and younger heroes to work out in the training rooms until they were feeling a little calmer. Then, of course, they emptied Simon's pockets, over his vociferous protests that of _course_ he hadn't been _trying_ to steal anything, he just...picked things up. One of the things he'd picked up had at least been a sandwich for Merlin, but the contents of the rest of his pockets, including the hidden ones inside his sleeves and the legs of his pants, were all quite strictly contraband.

As Merlin sat in the corner of the control room, eating his sandwich and looking embarassed, and the adults discussed where they could stash the tuxedoed menace so that he couldn't cause any more damage, the light over the dimensional gate flashed red again, and someone leaned through.

“What could _possibly_ be taking you so—ah.” Loki looked at the ring of heroes hemming Simon in and raised an eyebrow. “While I appreciate your dedication, beloved, I think you may have gotten a bit ahead of yourself.”

Simon beamed at him. “Could very well be, boss. I live only to please.”

At a quiet nod from Superman, a number of Justice Leaguers had split away to surround the gate, wordlessly slipping into combat-ready stances.

“As much as that thrills me to no end, I'm getting very tired of being glared at suspiciously. It feels rather too much like Asgard. And you have classes to teach, unless you wish to relegate the burden entirely to your TA. I think she's getting overworked.”

“Well, what else are TAs for? I'm not young anymore, I can't do everything.” Simon sprang lightly into the air, causing several Justice Leaguers to jump back in surprise, and floated over to the gate—or rather, tried to float over to the gate and then found himself caught in a bubble of green energy. “Oh, give it a rest, Lantern, I'm trying to get _out_ of your hair. Which you don't have.”

Loki lifted a hand and gestured, and Simon disappeared from Jon Stewart's bubble and reappeared next to the gate. “I'll take him home before he causes any more—oh, _relax._ If I'd intended you any harm I can assure you that you'd all be dead already.” He wrapped an arm possessively around Simon's waist and then turned to look at Merlin. “Young man, you've lost me a bet, but I can't say I'm entirely unhappy that you survived.”

Superman glanced at Steve, who shook his head almost imperceptibly. _It's not worth arguing with him._ So instead he nodded stiffly to Loki. “Thank you for your assistance in this problem.”

“I assure you,” said Loki, looking him up and down with some approval, “the pleasure was _entirely_ mine. Come along, my dedicant, we have appointments to keep.”

Once they had disappeared back through the gate, Jon Stewart scowled. “Who the _hell_ was that?”

Steve sighed. “That was Loki.”

“Norse god of mischief and the greatest bane of our collective existences short of things that actually want to eat the planet, and before you ask, yes, he's always that full of himself.” Carol Danvers looked over to where Merlin was sitting in the corner eating. “Shouldn't we be getting Hawkeye Junior here home?”

“No!” The vehemence of Merlin's shout startled everyone, and even people who hadn't been listening turned to stare. He blanched when he saw how many people were looking at him. “I mean...it's Lex Luthor's fault that I'm here, don't I get to see you kick his ass?”

Clint frowned. “Wizard, your moms will murder me if I put you in danger.”

“I want to _help!_ ”

Superman smiled kindly. “Merlin, you've already been a great help. If it wasn't for you we would never have met your father and his friends.”

Steve nodded. “It's true, son. You've done plenty. You ought to go home.”

Everyone waited expectantly for Merlin to see reason, but instead he stared at them with an expression of growing horror on his face, and finally forced out, “...oh my _god._ I'm a _MacGuffin._ ”

Not what anyone had been expecting. Superman blinked. “I'm sorry?”

“It's a modern literary term.” Mr. Terrific had managed to tear himself away from looking at the dimensional gate. “Popularized by Alfred Hitchcock. A MacGuffin drives the plot but isn't really otherwise important. Right, kid?”

“Exactly! I...I _refuse_ to just be _Rick Jones_ or someone. I want to _do_ something. Provide information if nothing else. Come on, Dad, _you_ at least know how much of a nerd I am, vouch for me!”

Clint scratched the back of his head. “Well, yeah, you are kind of a dweeb. You're almost worse than Carol. I don't see how that's relevant, though, I'm pretty sure that whatever's going on here never happened in your comics.”

“That doesn't mean I don't know anything useful!”

“Actually, that may be the case.” Everyone jumped. Batman had materialized again, while nobody was looking. He nodded gravely to Merlin. “Merlin, what do you know about Apokolips?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Up next: What _does_ Merlin know about Apokolips? And why is it relevant? And how many more Avengers can we fit onto the Watchtower?
> 
> **Actual End Notes**
> 
> So I've run out of buffer. Will still be making every effort to keep up the M-W-F update schedule, but please excuse me if I get a little behind.


	9. Big Budget Crossover

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Avengers arrive in force on the Watchtower, and everyone finally gets briefed on what the hell Lex Luthor is up to here.

“Yeah. Of course we'll get you souvenirs, we're probably going to keep up correspondence. Yeah, we owe you one. _Of course,_ Summers, who do you think I am? I'm Tony goddamn Stark, that's who. Ok, talk to you later.” Tony hung up the phone. “Summers says his team will keep an eye on things while we're away, make sure Doom doesn't take over or anything.”

“Good. Reed went to get his people; he said if I didn't let him come along this time he'd do something awful to the mansion, and I'm not sure whether or not to believe him.”

“I'd believe him. He's excitable like that. You making the call or what, Cap?”

“In a minute. I'm just taking this all in.”

“I know, right? We found a universe with heroes who _aren't_ us. It's so exciting. I'm almost giddy. Not that I ever get _giddy,_ of course, but you know what I mean.”

Steve took a deep breath, grinning, and hit a button on the communications console. “Full Avengers assembly at the mansion, code San Diego. I repeat, this is Captain America. Avengers, assemble, code San Diego.”

The speakers crackled to life with acknowledgement upon acknowledgement, every hero who was or had at one time been an Avenger switching on their communicators to let him know they were coming. A lot of them sounded excited; apart from one unfortunate incident with a machine of Reed's, there hadn't been a code San Diego since...well, San Diego, and all of the younger members were itching to travel between worlds.

After a few minutes Jarvis said, _“Everyone has arrived, sir.”_

“Excellent. Please tell them to meet us down here in the lab.”

Pietro arrived first, of course—or rather, Steve looked up to see that he was already there, grinning and lazily eating an apple. “Morning, Captain. Is something exciting afoot?”

“Wait for the debriefing, Quicksilver. But...” Steve thought of the Flash, who he'd been introduced to before they left to get everyone together, “I think you're going to like it.”

The lab slowly filled up as a rumble from above them announced that the Fantasticar had just landed on the roof. A moment later Reed and the rest of the Fantastic Four emerged from the reinforced elevator they'd designed for Ben Grimm. Sue looked like she was stifling laughter. “Hi, everyone. Captain. Just so you know, we spotted Deadpool on the way here, you may want to put a guard detail on the gate.”

Steve nodded to her. “Thanks, Sue, that's good to know. Anyway, it's good to see everyone.”

There were murmurs in the frankly enormous crowd. Steve ticked off all the names he knew as he looked them over—some of these people even _he_ hadn't worked with; there _were_ times when he hadn't been with the team. In the back, for example, Iron Fist was perched on top of a cleared table, making quiet chit-chat with Luke Cage and Daredevil, while nearer the front Spider-Woman and Tigra seemed deeply engaged in a conversation about hand-to-hand fighting styles. At the edge of the crowd stood Wiccan and Hulkling and their friends in a nervous group, the not-quite-so-Young Avengers finally getting to work on a big mission. It was heartening to see so many heroes in one place. They may have had their differences in the past, but in an emergency they could all work together.

He cleared his throat, and slowly the crowd's attention started to turn to him. “I know an assemblage of this size is somewhat unprecedented, so I appreciate you all getting here in a hurry. I'm sure you're wondering what's going on.”

Black Panther shrugged. “You called a code San Diego. I rather enjoyed our first trip to San Diego.”

Near him, Thor was frowning and looking around the room. “Has my brother been here?”

“He has, actually.” That got another wave of surprised murmurs. “However, I'd like to assure you all that this particular incident is _not_ his fault—we're not looking at another World Tree incident here, I promise.” Sighs of relief, and some laughter. “He was called in to consult, actually. As a few of you know, in the past few days we've been working on a missing-persons case on behalf of some acquaintances in another dimension, actually the women who assisted us in the original dimensional-travel incidents. In the process of locating their son we discovered an entirely _other_ world, one much more similar to our own but which, you'll all be happy to know, doesn't contain any insane versions of us or people we know.”

“No Iron Maniacs, no creepy female Deadpools, no zombies...” Tony grinned. “It's pretty awesome.”

“Anyway, their primary crimefighting team, the Justice League, is facing a major crisis of their own right now, and I've offered them our assistance. A little extra firepower always helps, right?”

From the back Wonderman shouted, “So what are we facing?”

“Ah...an army of evil alien robots, as far as we can tell.” The Young Avengers looked thrilled, and Steve smiled at them. “But I think I'll let Batman explain it to you when we get through to the Watchtower.”

Eric O'Grady lifted up the visor of his helmet. “They're Jehovah's Witnesses? Ok, I'm out.”

Steve sighed. “No, O'Grady, they're not Jehovah's Witnesses. At least not as far as anyone told me. Dr. Richards, let's turn on the gate.”

 

\--

 

In the command room of the Watchtower, the light over the gate flashed and Clint looked up from where he and Green Arrow had been talking about styles of bow. The Robin Hood lookalike preferred a classic composite bow, which Clint found frankly fascinating—he could shoot one, of course, but without his collapsible SHIELD-tech bow he didn't know where he'd be. At the sign of the gate alarm, however, he grinned. “Arrow, man, it's time to meet the gang.”

“How many people should I be expecting here?”

“Well, I'm pretty sure Cap was calling a code San Diego—”

“San Diego?”

“Long story. _Really_ long story. Anyway, if he did that then that means we may be getting...oh, seventy people, maybe eighty. More if he called the X-Men up, but he probably didn't. Somebody's gotta mind the fort.” As Steve stepped through the gate and moved over to speak to Superman, Clint started to think about what they were getting into, and his grin widened. “Man, I'm _really_ hoping he snagged Wolverine. You'll either love him or hate him, but either way he's always a party. Speaking of which, is there a place here where we're allowed to smoke?”

Arrow glanced at him sidelong. “One or two. Why? You don't seem like a smoker.”

“Wolverine. If we let him get into his cigars in any public space the stink lingers for weeks.”

Next through were Tony and Bruce, and then Thor—“Shit, he's almost as big as Supes.”—and then Natasha stepped through and Green Arrow whistled quietly. “Granted, I'm married, but _that_ is my kind of woman.”

Clint elbowed him, hard. “No, that's actually _my_ kind of woman.”

“Lord, boy, that's your kid's mom? She looks like she could kill me with her pinky.”

“She could. But...no, not Merlin's mom. Part of that long story I mentioned earlier. His moms...aren't from our neighborhood.” Natasha was heading over to them. Clint waved at her. “Hey, Nat. This is Green Arrow. He's like me, but really political. Arrow, this is Black Widow, the scariest woman on the planet. We're dating.”

Green Arrow gave Natasha a calculating look and then swept his hat off and bowed. She smiled faintly. “Nice to meet you, Green Arrow.”

“Pleasure to meet you as well, Ms. Widow. I suspect I'm going to have to introduce you to my wife.”

Natasha raised an eyebrow, although she didn't seem like she was especially irritated with Green Arrow—not that Clint could always tell when she was annoyed. She gestured back at the gate. “So Cap called in everyone.”

“I _noticed—_ shit, Aaron! Hey! Seriously, Arrow, you _have_ to meet Aaron, he's the best robot ever.”

Aaron Stack noticed them, waved, and starting heading in their direction. “Hawkeye. How the fuck long has it _been?_ ”

“ _Way_ too long, man. Green Arrow, meet Machine Man, the only robot I've ever met who can get drunk.”

“Programmed the alcohol receptors myself.”

Green Arrow shook hands with Aaron, grinning massively. Nearby, other members of the Justice League were starting to wander in, drawn by the influx of visitors, and he flagged one down. “Tornado! Yeah, Red, I meant you. Get over here!” To his companions, and particularly to Aaron, he said, “Maybe you could teach Tornado that trick. Could use something to make him lighten up.”

“What trick?” said Red Tornado as he drew closer to the group.

Green Arrow stifled a snicker.

The stream of Avengers through the dimensional gate and Leaguers up from the rest of the Watchtower continued unabated until the room looked less like the hub of a major crimefighting group and more like a social club. Clusters of people converged, grew, and broke up again, and at one point an impromptu ring formed around Valkyrie and Power Girl, who had taken an instant liking to one another and chose to display their new friendship via an unplanned sparring match. The young heroes and sidekicks, with Merlin in tow, had immediately gravitated to the Young Avengers, and together they had sat down on the floor in a corner—from the looks getting tossed around, it was either to play matchmaker or hatch some kind of plot to form their own team. Hank Pym, Scott Lang, and the Atom were hunkered down over something that was probably nightmarishly complex, Reed Richards and Will Magnus were arguing at some length about an engineering problem, and far above everyone's heads, Spiderman and Nightwing were hanging from the ceiling, swapping stories.

“So he comes out with his sack—and I kid you not, it was actually a _sack,_ with a dollar sign on it—and he doesn't see me, because I'm up on the awning, and I just _tapped_ him on the shoulder with one of my sticks and I swear he screamed so high that it woke up every dog in the city. I spent the rest of the evening getting followed around by a pack of strays, but _luckily_ it also turned out that Catwoman was robbing a jewelry store in the area, so that turned out ok. You should've seen her face, she was _so_ angry.”

“Wait, Catwoman?”

“Yeah. Jewel thief. She and Batman have this thing, it's kinda weird.”

“Is she, like, really hot? Wears a lot of black, very grabby? High-volume sexual innuendo, all dick jokes all the time?”

“You sound like you've met her.”

“I have someone just _like_ that. Black Cat. Man, maybe our worlds are closer than Cap and your big Super-guy think.”

“That...that is _creepy._ ”

“Maybe it's a universal archetype? Hot cat-themed ladies?”

As one they looked down at the floor, where Tigra and Vixen were arguing about something, and said, in unison, “Nah. Couldn't be.”

After another moment of contemplation Spiderman said, “So, speaking of universal archetypes...you guys don't have a Deadpool around here, do you?”

Nightwing frowned. “What's a Deadpool?”

“Mercenary. Swords and guns, red and black color scheme, kind of a death wish.”

“Well, we have Deathstroke, he does _orange_ and black, but otherwise that sounds like him. He's been trying to kill me since I was, oh, fifteen? No, fourteen, that's it.”

“Wade never tries to kill me. Or most of the time he doesn't. He just gets really _weird._ ”

“Wait, _Wade?_ ”

“That's his name. Wade Wilson.” Spiderman paused. “...what's your guy's name?”

“...Slade Wilson.”

“Ok, that is just _spooky._ We...we should tell someone about this. Oh, hey, check it out, something's happening.”

Martian Manhunter had gone to the head of the room and turned on a massive display screen. As they watched he cleared his throat quietly and then spoke in a voice that carried throughout the entire vessel without being in any way loud. “It is time for the briefing to commence.”

The conversations faded as everyone turned to face him, and a few latecomers straggled in nnd took up spots at the back as the last of the Avengers finally stepped through the gate. The vast room was at this point impossibly crowded—the heroes stood shoulder to shoulder, in ragged rank and file, so intermixed already that it was difficult to tell who had come from where.

The last to arrive were the Flash and Pietro, who suddenly materialized, one after the other, at the front of the crowd. They had been introduced to each other earlier and had immediately disappeared; now they stood side by side, panting. Pietro looked irritated. “We're going to re-run that later, yes?”

The Flash grinned at him. “If you want. I'll still win.”

“I _refuse_ to believe that.”

“I can tell you all the science, if you like.”

Manhunter shot them a quelling look before clearing his throat again. “Friends and visitors, we do not currently have all the facts about our situation, but the others on the council and I felt that as much detail as could be given, should be given. We are facing a crisis of unexpected proportions, involving what seems to be an alliance between two of our great foes.” He moved to type in a sequence on the command room computers. “The artist renderings I am using in this briefing were provided by our young friend Merlin Baker, who has been a great help to us in piecing together this situation.”

The screen lit up with an image: a large bald man in a tailored suit, with a smug expression on his face.

“For our visiting friends, this man is Lex Luthor, a long-time enemy of Superman's, a businessman, a scientist, and a dangerous criminal mind.”

Near the front, Tony raised an armored hand, and turned to say to the crowd, “Quick Avengers summary. He's like Justin Hammer but competent.”

“Thank you, Iron Man. Leaguers, you will recall that the boom tube incidents began approximately one month ago, following an unexplained power outage in Metropolis.” _Click._ An artist's rendering of the skyline of Metropolis. “From interviews with some of the criminals we apprehended during the Hostage Auction, we have been able to determine the cause of both the outage and the subsequent incidents. This is a clip from one of our interviews.”

_Click._ Video footage, of a small room in the Watchtower. Metallo is there, tied to a chair by a glowing golden rope under a bright light. Wonder Woman is pacing in front of him.

_**Metallo:** _ _Yeah, I got some work from Luthor a couple of weeks ago. Who hasn't? I needed cash._

_**Wonder Woman:** _ _What was the work?_

_**Metallo:** _ _Pickin' up boomers. He said he was working on something big, didn't wanna be disturbed._

_**Wonder Woman:** _ _Did he tell you what he was working on?_

_**Metallo:**_ _[cockeyed look] When does Luthor tell_ anyone _what he's working on? No, obviously he didn't._

_**Wonder Woman:** _ _Did you notice anything strange?_

_**Metallo:** _ _Stranger than usual? Yeah, he wore sunglasses the whole time. Looked like he hadn't been sleeping a ton. The glasses fell off once; his eyes were pretty red. Like he had contacts in._

_**Wonder Woman:** _ _[frowning] Anything else?_

_**Metallo:** _ _Kept talking to himself. Biblical shit. Dark side, apocalypse, demons, something about his mom...look, he's off his fucking nut, but his money's still good. That's all I care about._

_Click._ More video footage, of the same room, but this time the person being interrogated is the Riddler, who is slouched in the chair, looking unimpressed. Batman is looming over him.

_**Riddler:** _ _—ker didn't get him though, did he? I think on the whole I've been doing you a favor keeping the boomers off the streets._

_**Batman:** _ _[ignoring that] What do you know about Luthor's recent activities?_

_**Riddler:** _ _Not a ton, Bats. I called him up a few days before the boomers started showing up. Had some things to discuss. We—_

_**Batman:** _ _[interrupting] What things?_

_**Riddler:** _ _Not relevant._

_**Batman:**_ What _did you need to discuss with Luthor, Riddler?_

_**Riddler:**_ _Look, I don't even remember. We got sidetracked._ He _was distracted like I've never seen him before—said he'd gotten a shipment of something he'd been wanting for a while. Plural, actually,_ somethings. _Planning on revolutionizing the transportation industry._

_**Batman:** _ _Mother boxes._

_**Riddler:**_ _You said it. I figure two, maybe three? No_ idea _how he got them—if_ I _could get my hands on a mother box—_

_**Batman:** _ _Focus, Riddler. Did you talk to him again after that?_

_**Riddler:** _ _Called him again after the outage in Metropolis, after that first incident, you know the one._

_**Batman:** _ _The Superwoman._

_**Riddler:** _ _That one, yeah. I asked him what the hell he was doing, he just said “experiments” and then started asking me if I knew where to find a Parademon's body._

_**Batman:** _ _So you told him to contact the Secret Six._

_**Riddler:**_ No, _Bats, I_ hired _the Secret Six. You think I_ want _Luthor getting more power? That Merkel freak_ loves _to talk about his best pal. Started tracking his spending after that, he got real big into shipments of robotics equipment._

_**Batman:** _ _We knew that part, Riddler. Care to tell us what he was making?_

_**Riddler:** _ _How should I know? Probably something to do with the Parademons._

_Click._ The video footage disappeared, replaced with an artist's rendering of a burly alien in gaudy yellow and green. There were murmurs in the crowd already, and Manhunter had to resort to another resounding cough before everyone settled down. “As many of you already know, the Luthor we apprehended at the Auction was in fact a highly-advanced android, incorporating pieces of alien technology. According to some reliable sources—yes, child, you can wave if you like,” and Merlin waved nervously to the crowd from his spot in the corner, “Luthor's red eyes most likely indicate some sort of psychic connection with Darkseid.” _Click._ An artist's rendering of Darkseid.

Steve frowned. “He looks...familiar.”

“Yes, Merlin tells me that he has a rough counterpart in your world, a...Thanos? In any case, if Luthor has been compromised by Darkseid then this is an unprecedented threat. We do not yet know what robotics work he is doing, or how he intends to involve the Parademons, but—”

A speaker on a nearby console turned on with a feedback shriek. “Watchtower, this is Supergirl! I just took out a Parademon _robot_ near Hub City, and it looks like there are a few more coming!”

Another speaker crackled on with, “—tower, this is Green Lantern Kyle Rayner, I have a small squadron of Parademons converging on the Teen Titans HQ in San Francisco Bay, I need some help here!”

Black Panther had cocked his head to the side. “It would seem that this is the answer to your question, Manhunter. Your Luthor is creating an army of—”

The display screen went dark, and then lit up with a video feed of—a mustache. Then whoever was in front of the camera moved back, revealing themselves to be Deadshot, cigarette hanging from one corner of his mouth. “—this thing on? We got your hack thing working? Ok, yeah, I see 'em.” He looked directly out at them, waving. “Yeah, hey, Justice League. You hearing me?”

“We hear you.” Superman looked displeased. “How did you tap into our frequency?”

“Fuck if I know, I don't do computers, the House does half of it. Look, Ragdoll's freaking out here, we just wrecked a few android Parademons in Montpelier. Where the fuck are you people?” Wthout waiting for a response, he continued with, “Anyway, we have maybe three-quarters of a robot for you if you wanna get this shit out of our way _._ ”

Superman looked slightly non-plussed. “That's...good of you.”

“Ha ha, Supes. We don't want a robot apocalypse any more than you do. We'll leave the thing near that lighthouse Aquaman likes, he can bring it up if he's feeling social.”

“Why not bring it yourself?”

“Very funny. How's the kid? He get himself killed yet?”

Batman scowled. “Not even slightly, Deadshot. Just drop off the robot and we'll take it from there.”

“Say please, Bats.”

“Deadshot...”

“Ok, ok, we don't want it anyway. Hey, Scandal, how do I turn this thing—”

The screen switched off completely, and Black Panther nodded. “As I was saying, these calls seem to answer your question. Your Luthor is building some sort of army.”

“This is worrying.” Manhunter surveyed the crowd with an increasingly concerned expression. “And we must provide assistance to our colleagues, and search for more. Avengers, if you would like to assist us...?”

Steve nodded. “We'd be honored.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Up next: A battle to determine the fate of the multiverse! (Again!)


	10. Invasion Crisis

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The battle begins, Merlin gets a costume, and everything is _so exciting oh my god!_

The plan was going nicely.

_Yes._

The rout at Riddler's Auction actually helped things along—though the loss of the Lexbot and the well-informed boomer boy had been a shame, it was better to have less company. He could work unimpeded this way. He was making so much progress. He'd come close before, but never like this.

_It is in our grasp._

Superman's destruction.

_Anti-Life._

The failure of his initial experiments had led to possibilities of power beyond his wildest dreams. Mother Box (Boxes, rather, One and Two) gave him the _reach_ he needed, but _Father—_ Father Box gave him _guidance._ It was Father Box who had suggested the plan, who helped him learn _how_ and _where._

And why...

 _Why_ was he doing this again?

_For me._

Oh, yes. For Father Box.

His army increased exponentially. Each Parademon 2.0, when completed, began work on a new Parademon 2.0. If it hadn't been for Mother One, holding the boom tube open so that he could store the army in the pocket dimension he'd found, he would have long ago run out of space. His army would cover the Earth. Better, they would _destroy_ the Earth. That was the _key_...the key to...

_Superman._

Yes! Superman's destruction. His undoing. His _rage._

_We will destroy all that he holds dear. We will undo him. There is power in his suffering, and with it we will unlock Anti-Life._

Anti-Life. Was that what he wanted?

 _Yes. For me._ I _want it._

He did feel, faintly, the brush of regret. The pocket dimension was unstable. Mother One was in pain, and Mother Two's sympathetic convulsions did have some unexpected side effects. The boomers wouldn't be a problem, though. They could be dealt with in the destruction of the Earth.

_You will prevail. For Darkseid._

Yes. For Father Box.

 

\--

 

“Do I get a costume?”

Clint pinched the bridge of his nose. “No, Merlin, you don't get a costume.”

Merlin frowned. “You said I could help, though.”

“Yes. And you helped. Vital information. Without your scarily massive digital comics collection we wouldn't know half of what we do. But for the actual _fighting_ you get to stay here at the Watchtower and keep an eye on things, and then when I get you home I'm recommending that your mothers ground you until you grow a sense of self-preservation.”

“But—”

“ _Archers,_ wizard. We're _archers._ Ranged combat. We stay at the _back._ _Way_ at the back, in your case, since you don't have any combat experience. End of discussion, wizard. You stay here.” He hitched his quiver to sit more comfortably. “Anyway, you'll have company. The Young Avengers are here, and those Titan kids. Someone has to hold down the fort.”

Green Arrow hurried past, fixing his mask as he ran. “Hey, Hawkeye, you coming or what?”

“On it, chill out.” Clint pulled Merlin into a sideways hug, ruffling his hair. “Look, I gotta scramble or I'll be late to the party, kiddo. Stay safe or your moms will kill me. Love ya. Hey, Arrow, wait up!”

He hurried off. Merlin stared after him, swallowing hard.

“Hey.”

He jumped, looking around. “Oh. Hey, Bart. Hey, Tommy.”

“We can hook you up with a costume.” Tommy patted him on the shoulder, grinning. “Kate already started making designs for it. Hope you like blue; she felt too threatened to put you in purple.”

“Aw, _weak._ ”

“And Robin grabbed your bow and quiver from Batman.” Bart was grinning too; he and Tommy had become the multiverse's most terrifying BFFs seconds after meeting.

Merlin blinked, straightening. “You have my quiver?”

“Yeah, we grabbed it from the Secret Six's van during the bust. Sentimental value?”

“It was a birthday present.”

“Cool stuff. Biggest thing I got for my last birthday was the complete series of _Entourage_.” Tommy seized one of his arms. “You need a codename.”

Bart grabbed the other arm, and together they started running toward the main training room, carrying him between them. “How do you feel about Wizard?”

 

\--

 

Parademons were attacking _everywhere._ There were so _many_ of them, squadrons of five or ten apiece, descending on every population center, destroying everything in sight in the more rural areas. Tree were ripped from the ground. Rocks were split. Roads were torn up and the ground crumbled as they struck.

The Watchtower teleporter set down teams across the planet. There had been some direction involved, but most of the groups had formed naturally, out of the simple confluence of powers and personalities. There was no clean separation between visitor and native.

In Keystone City, Sara Pezzini heard the sound of battle and raised the Witchblade, only to see that the people approaching her this time did not appear hostile. One of them lifted his hands in peace and said, “Detective Pezzini? I'm the Flash, and this is Quicksilver.”

Quicksilver waved to her, smirking. “Charmed.”

She stared at them. “How do you know my name?”

“That's a long story, ma'am.” The Flash smiled at her. “We've got kind of a situation here. Feel like helping us kick some ass?”

In Gotham the invading Parademons found nothing to bar their path, and they charged down the streets flipping cars and laughing at the crowds of screaming civilians. It seemed that they were unstoppable, and they laughed their electric laughs.

And then one of their number found himself inextricably caught in a sticky web that spanned the width of the street.

A light, cheery voice above their heads said, “Whaddaya think, Nightwing? I hold 'em, you punch?”

“Sounds like a good plan to me, Spiderman.” A dark figure dropped from one of the streetlights, escrima sticks in hand, and knocked the first Parademon robot's head off.

The battle had begun.

 

\--

 

“Ok, I'm feeling _really_ exposed here. Is there some reason that I have to be in my underwear for this?”

Kate didn't look up from the console of the Watchtower's costume fabricator. “I can't get an accurate reading of your measurements if you're already dressed. Oh my god, by the way, I wish I had one of these at home, it's amazing.”

“She's totally lying.” Blue Beetle grinned from under his mask. “I'm pretty sure the girls just wanted to make sure that they got a look at you naked.”

“What? _Why?_ ”

“Rite of passage.” Teddy looked like he was stifling the urge to laugh. “If you want to be on a super-team you have to put up with your teammates seeing you in your underwear.”

“All right!” Kate reached over to grab the costume designs she'd drawn up and started feeding them into the fabricator. “No, don't get dressed yet, this should...hey, Raven, how long does this thing normally take?”

Raven shrugged. “Not too long, really. A few minutes.”

“Ok, then, you guys figure out that codename thing while I finish this up.”

“Yeah.” Merlin hurried off the scanner pad and sat down against the wall, wrapping his arms around his knees. “I don't see why I can't be Raptor.”

“It's simple.” Red Robin was hanging by his knees from the high beam. “ _I'm_ Red Robin. Kate there is already Hawkeye, and she has seniority, and the _current_ Robin is around here somewhere unless...I think he managed to get into the teleporters with the adults somehow. Anyway, we can't have another bird-themed codename, it would be confusing.” A pause, and, “ _I_ don't see what the problem is with Wizard.”

“It's a play on my real name! How is that secure?”

“Well, then, what are your talents? Apart from being weirdly well-informed, that is.”

“I...I have really good aim. Like, if I can focus on something I can hit it. With pretty much anything.”

Aqualad nodded. “Pretty straightforward. How about Bullseye?”

As one, all of the Young Avengers and Merlin said, “No!” Aqualad looked taken aback, and Cassie coughed nervously. “We already have a Bullseye where we're from. He's evil.”

“What about Tell?” Beast Boy had scrambled over to perch on the pommel horse. “Y'know, like William Tell?”

Cyborg sighed. “Gar, that's a terrible codename.”

“I think it's good!”

“Yes, but you also _decided_ to be Beast Boy.”

Tommy chimed in with, “Sniper. Or Scope. Or Sureshot. Something about his aim.”

Billy squinted at Merlin. “I'd do more fictional archers, but we can't call you Apollo, it'd make you seem full of yourself and you're not blonde.”

Wonder Girl, meanwhile, had drifted over to the costume fabrication machine and was looking over Kate's shoulder at the designs. “Oh, neat...hey, though, you can't use that shade of blue, it'll clash with his hair.”

Kate looked at it critically. “True, ok. Little bit darker, maybe a _hint_ of midnight...”

“Yeah, better.”

Cassie expanded so that she could look at the screen over their heads. “You need an accent color too, one that's not a shade of blue. Green would look nice with his hair. Not Robin green, though, maybe a forest green would work.”

Miss Martian nodded approvingly. “Darker than me, I think. That would be suitable.”

Raven pursed her lips. “Do you think his hair should be visible? It doesn't have to be, you could put him in a hood.”

“Or a cowl,” Batgirl added. “Cowls are nice.”

“I couldn't. I really couldn't.” Kate's fingers were flying over the keys now. “It's such _nice_ hair, it'd be a crime to cover it up.”

Merlin looked over, surprised. “I have nice hair?”

“You have nice hair. Now hush and let the boys think of a codename for you. Oh my god, by the way, these fabrication options are amazing, I _need_ one of these machines, I'd never have to touch a sewing machine again.”

By the time the girls had settled on the design and Merlin's new costume had been spit out of the machine, the boys still hadn't decided on what to call him. Merlin ducked behind the machine to change, and emerged to a round of applause. He bowed awkwardly and then accepted his bow and quiver from Red Robin. “Thanks, Kate. I feel very...colorful. Hey, cool, you gave me a belt loop for my bow.”

“Of course! You look good!” She beamed at him. “Did the boys give you a name yet?”

“Not yet...”

“Don't worry, they'll think of something.”

A communications alert went off, and they all jumped and then ran back to the command room, Merlin still adjusting the strap of his quiver across his chest. On one of the consoles, a video communications feed had gone live, and a man in red and yellow was leaning in toward the camera. “Justice League? Come in, Justice League, where the hell are you people?”

Red Robin frowned. “Who is that?”

Merlin stared. “Holy shit. That's Mr. Miracle, the cool one. I _love_ him. Here, hang on...” He moved in so that he was centered in front of the console's camera and slapped the “answer” button. “Mr. Miracle, you've got the Watchtower.”

Mr. Miracle peered at him. “Looks like, but who are you supposed to be?”

“I'm, um...” he glanced down at the collapsible bow hanging from his belt. “I'm Quickdraw. Of the Young Titans. What can we help you with, Mr. Miracle?”

“Where's the Justice League?”

“On Earth,” said Red Robin, stepping forward. “They're dealing with a threat. We're manning the Watchtower.”

Mr. Miracle nodded. “Yeah, ok. So what in _hell_ is going on? Motherboxxx is _frightened,_ and the boom tubes have gone screwy. Orion headed off to Earth two weeks ago and I haven't heard from him since.”

Red Robin paused, glancing to the side and muttering, “...Quickdraw. You know who he is. Can we trust him?”

“Hell _yes_ we can trust him. He's _awesome._ ”

“All right.” He raised his voice again. “It's a little complicated, Mr. Miracle. I'll have Quickdraw explain it to you, he has more of the details.”

“Wait, _me?_ ”

“You have all the comics, you're the expert, you tell him.”

Mr. Miracle was watching them. He looked amused. “I'm waiting, here.”

“Um...” Merlin gulped. “Lex Luthor has obtained at least two mother boxes, and I _think_ also a father box, but I don't have details, I can't be sure.”

The amused look disappeared. “A _father_ box? How would he have gotten—”

“We don't know. All we know is that he's been possessed by Darkseid and is now attacking the Earth with an army of robot Parademons. There have been rogue boom tubes going off all over the place, and they're pulling people from other _universes._ Like me. I'm from another universe.”

“That's—”

There was a vast _THUMP_ , and the Watchtower shook. Klaxons screamed. Teddy and Cyborg ran to one of the monitors, and then Cyborg shouted, “Parademons! We're under attack!”

On the video feed Mr. Miracle swore. “Ok, look, any of you kids know how to run the teleporters?”

Kate and the other Young Avengers glanced at each other, shrugging, but Wonder Girl nodded. “Of course we do. Where are you?”

“Tibet. I was _aiming_ for Metropolis, but like I said, the boom tubes are a mess. Beam me up. I'll give you a hand.”

 

\--

 

The news from the monitors was...troubling.

Luthor could see from his surveillance equipment that the heroes had noticed his initial sallies, and had responded. He'd been expecting that, of course—he'd had any number of contingency plans in place to deal with the Justice League. Somehow, though, they'd _expanded;_ there were more heroes than he'd ever seen before, in unfamiliar costumes, faces and manners strange to him. Boomers, he realized, or something similar. The Justice League had called in helpers from all dimensions.

 _No matter,_ said Father Box in the back of his head. _They will all fall before our might._

Yes, of course, that was reasonable. His army couldn't be stopped. After all, he'd built it. They would destroy the Earth, and Anti-Life would be unlocked at the heart of Superman's ultimate sorrow. From there this universe could be taken, and then the next, and the next...

He tapped in the sequence that began activating his new power armor and then turned to the table on which Mothers One and Two sat. “Mother Box, release my army.”

_BOOM._

On the monitors, his army emerged to cover the Earth.

 

\--

 

And lo, there dawned a day both bright and glorious, when heroes of like minds joined hands and hearts across the worlds to combat a foe who threatened the very foundations of reality!!! Their numbers were countless and their determination unshakeable, and while one hero alone might never have been enough to defeat the enemy, together they formed an army the likes of which had never before been seen!!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Up next: The battle continues! Foes are fought, Chekhov's guns are fired, and things get _even more awesome_
> 
>  
> 
> **Actual End Notes**
> 
>  
> 
> The costume fabricator on the Watchtower is strictly headcanon, but I _have_ to assume that they have one. Y'know, for when someone wants to change their costume, or needs a new one for a special mission. I figure Tony's gonna steal the idea for the Mansion when the fighting's over.
> 
> Writing the last bit in Jack Kirby's style was _so fun._


	11. Final War

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The fate of the world is decided in one massive, epic, spatially-and-temporally-improbable battle!

A vast round hole had opened in the sky, and Parademons were pouring forth, their voices a discordant chorus of snarls and hisses as they descended upon the world. Across the globe, heroes, villains, and ordinary citizens alike looked up into the yawning hole in eternity, and the air was filled with screaming.

Tony Stark, back to back with Steel in the middle of Oregon and surrounded by a ring of snarling robots, swore sulfurously. “This is starting to look _way_ too familiar. I _better_ not have to fly into another hole in space.”

Steel swung his hammer, sending a Parademon crashing into two others. “You do that a lot, then?”

“Once was enough! I almost died!”

“Hell, Stark, we all die sometimes. Doesn't cause too many problems in the long run.”

“I guess that's one way of putting it.”

“Only way that makes sense to me. On your left!”

The world around them was shaking, and it seemed that all the battles were happening in the same place, all merging onto one vast killing field that stretched from horizon to horizon. Robot parts and blood flew in equal quantities, though none of the heroes seemed in danger of falling. Rather, they stood taller, became larger as they fought side by side, their movements blending together in a blur of synchronicity. They were unstoppable. Ranks of Parademons charged and fell, charged and fell, charged and fell.

Then the ground shook, and the Lexcorp building, somehow both clearly visible and impossibly far away, split open to reveal a vast, man-like figure, clad in midnight blue, red eyes gleaming in its grey face.

Civilians worldwide screamed and did not know why, and Batman shouted, “It's Darkseid!”

Superman and his family had risen high into the air to see Darkseid better, and after a moment Superman shook his head, his voice booming across the battlefield. “It's a robot! I can see Luthor piloting it!”

Steve Rogers looked up to the Kryptonians and held up a hand. “Get me up there so I can see the battlefield!”

 

\--

 

The Watchtower shook as it was struck by several charging Parademons, and Cassie Lang shrieked, ducking out of the way of a falling piece of support. “This place is a death trap!”

“Well, then, we'll all be perfectly fine.” Mr. Miracle grinned at the horrified looks the young heroes gave him. “Death traps are my specialty. You kids spread out; I'll stay here and keep in touch with all of you through the comms. Anything I see, I'll let you know.”

Red Robin took a deep breath, clearly quelling a look of fear, and then nodded sharply. “Roger that. Ti...Young Titans, with me! Space suits are this way! We need to get outside the satellite!”

They reached spacewalk storage in record time and dressed even more quickly, even including the time that had to be spent letting Red Robin correct the fastenings and buckles on their suits. Billy let out a huff of air, clouding the bottom of his helmet. “Where are we going out, Red Robin?”

“The main airlock, this way. From the monitors we saw that the Parademons are attacking from Earthside, so we'll be staying there, to fend off the attack at its head. Weapon-users, keep your grips tight; if you lose a weapon out there, we won't be able to get it back. Let's get outside and we can work out positioning once we're out there. Your boots are magnetized to hold you to the hull, so that shouldn't be a problem.”

Cassie frowned down at her space suit. “Is this going to handle my size changes properly?”

“If it can handle Beast Boy it can handle you, and we know the suits work for him. Should be fine for Hulkling as well. Let's move!”

Outside the airlock the young heroes were met by the weird silence of space and the sight of a small army of Parademons flying towards them. Billy threw up a shield around the group reflexively, and the others flashed him a thumbs up as Red Robin surveyed the situation.

Their communicators fuzzed static before turning on fully, and then Red Robin said, “All right. Wiccan, Raven, you've got heavy magical firepower, I want you front and center. Wonder Girl, Aqualad, stay with them. Keep them alive, take out whatever gets in too close. Hawkeye, Quickdraw, you two get up high on the hull, pick off as many as you can from a distance. Cyborg, you're with them, play keep-away with anything that gets in too close. Speed, Impulse, do what you do best—be _everywhere._ Stature, get below and get _big._ Any Parademon you can catch, do it. Beast Boy, Hulkling, you two are together. Do whatever comes naturally. Batgirl, you're my eyes on the ground, watch for blind spots and go where you think you're needed. Miss Martian, you're with me, we'll be flying high. Blue Beetle, you're on close air support—if you see someone in trouble, make it rain.”

“Hell _yes_ I'll make it rain. I'll bring the _pain._ I'll—”

“ _Focus,_ Beetle. We need to watch each others' backs. Watch _everyone's_ back. If you see something, speak up, but let's keep the chatter to a minimum, we need to conserve the air in our suits. Mr. Miracle, are you copying this?”

A faint clicking, and then Mr. Miracle said, “I copy. Got the surveillance equipment running. I'll tell you if I notice anything. Good luck, kids.”

Teddy grinned inside his helmet, expanding and turning green. “Luck is the last refuge of the unprepared, Mr. Miracle. We are _on_ this.”

Wonder Girl beamed at him. “That's probably the hottest thing you could have said just now.”

“Thanks, but I already have a boyfriend.”

“So do I, hot stuff. Just saying.”

The Parademons were closing in. Red Robin nodded. “All right, people, let's do this. Young Titans, go!”

 

\--

 

The battle was not going well. The Parademon robots continued to fall, but where one fell, another would rise, the army continuing to march out of the hole in the sky as if it had no ending at all. Steve Rogers was still in the air, held up by the Martian Manhunter so that he could roar orders at the heroes while Superman and his family tackled Lex Luthor in his massive suit of powered Darkseid armor. Everyone who could fly was already flying, tackling Parademons in the air while on the ground groups of heroes came together and fought side by side and then split again, driven apart by the oncoming hordes.

In the cockpit of his fine new armor, Lex Luthor smiled. His sight was blurry, true, and his head hurt, but his vision was clear. He was winning. He would _destroy._ Father Box was slotted into the compartment beside him, whispering its sibilant song, telling him where to turn and when to fire, guiding his hand. Mothers One and Two were still in the building, ensuring that his army's march did not cease. His army was myriad and legion, and it could not be stopped.

 _To your left, the attack of Superboy. Above you, Supergirl. Power Girl is approaching from behind. Superman is aiming for the chest. Look. Aim. Fire. Ignore the army, they are unimportant. I am ensuring their strikes. We must focus on our attackers. Supergirl must die. Superboy must die. Power Girl must die. Superman must be_ alone. _It is close now, it is in our grasp. Anti-Life is at hand._

Luthor cackled, ignoring the blood that flew from his mouth to spatter on the window of the cockpit. “Superman! Come and fight me!”

Faintly he could see the other heroes, familiar and alien alike, struggling against the onslaught of his army, and through the speakers he could hear the patriotic one with the shield shouting, “Come on! We can do this! We've all done it before!”

 _They will not do it again. I can feel it. Anti-Life is close. I can_ taste _it._

Victory was nigh.

 

\--

 

Merlin ducked a blast of energy and came up to fire an arrow into the forehead of an oncoming Parademon. “I'm going to throw up!”

Kate rolled her eyes, loosing a shot and sending another Parademon spinning. “Keep it together! Don't you have combat training?”

“No! I'm an _athlete!_ And you didn't have any combat training when you started either!”

“Ok, I see your point!”

Over the communicators, Mr. Miracle sighed. “Focus, kids, things are looking bad. Motherboxxx is a mess; if one of you goes down I don't know if she'll be able to fix you.”

Farther down the hull of the Watchtower, Billy and Raven were huddled underneath a magical shield, firing off sloppy bursts of energy while Aqualad and Wonder Girl struggled to keep off the increasingly large group of attacking robots. Red Robin leaped for one Parademon and missed, hurtling into the hull with a painful-sounding thump.

Teddy swore. “This isn't going too well, guys!”

 

\--

 

But no! But wait!

The tide of the battle was turning!

The heroes fought, and fought, and as they fought they slowly stopped _thinking_ about it and began to simply revel in the joy of _protection._ This...this was something they believed in. This was something they'd spent their entire lives doing. The world was in danger, but it would not fall if they had anything to say about it.

Quicksilver and the Flash pinballed Parademons back and forth, chivvying them forward until they ran into the raised sword of Sara Pezzini.

Dr. Strange and Zatanna stood back to back, hands outstretched, the oncoming robots falling into their component parts at the touch of their mystical might.

Aquaman, at a shouted order, lifted Wolverine bodily and hurled him, claws outstretched, into a cluster of Parademons, where the smaller man landed with a howl and the screech of metal on metal.

And slowly, surely, the joy spread through the battlefield, and even those who did not normally indulge themselves in such unserious behavior found themselves laughing, filled with the feeling of well-being, the fire of combat in the name of a righteous cause. They were defending the innocent, and they glowed with it.

_You are united._

Lex Luthor and the Father Box screamed, suddenly tasting something that they could not understand, and Superman broke through the defenses with a single punch, sending the massive Darkseid armor stumbling back.

_Laugh in the face of the darkness._

The heroes had found the heart of their power, the hope that rose when all else was lost.

_Life._

_Life._

_Life._

_**BOOM.**  
_

The heavens split, and the sky was filled with Orion.

He towered over them, twenty feet tall or more, smelling of ozone and covered in the scuff marks and dust of long travel. His mask was half-gone, and he held a glowing sword in one hand.

The glowing sword was of a kind that many on the battlefield recognized, but Iron Fist was the first to say, “Holy shit, does the big guy there have a _lightsaber?_ ”

Plastic Man stretched out his neck to get a slightly better view. “Looks like! He must've gotten _really_ lost.”

However lost he might have previously been, all was forgotten now: Orion was in a frothing rage, and he charged across the ground toward Lex Luthor and his massive robot heedless of the heroes and Parademons who warred around his feet. He was shouting something, his howling clearly audible even over the noise of the battlefield, and even Superman moved out of his way.

 _“You tortured Mother Box!”_ His voice was barely human, filled with the gravel of fury and pain. _“You caused her pain! She loves you, and you tortured her!”_

He reached the Darkseid robot and struck, sending the head flying. He struck again and took off a hand, and then an arm, then the other hand and the other arm. Around his feet the battle still raged. He turned off his sword and tossed it away, reaching out to tear open the cockpit in the Darkseid robot's chest. The Father Box, exposed in its mooring, keened an electric tone, and Orion yanked it out of its slot and crushed it, roaring as it exploded in his palm, and around him the Parademon robots froze and fell, suddenly lifeless. Then he reached for Lex Luthor, who sat in the pilot's seat, red eyes barely open, blood streaming from his noise and mouth.

He raised a massive hand to strike.

_“Soldier, stand down!”_

His hand stopped mid-fall, and he looked around to see who had spoken. “Who _dares?_ ”

Steve Rogers—not just Steve Rogers, either, but _Captain America—_ floated in the air before him, supported on nothing by every telekinetic and magic-user on the battlefield. He glared, implacable, arms crossed over his chest. “I distinctly remember telling you to _stand_ _down._ Superman?”

Superman flew over just in time to catch Lex Luthor as he fell from Orion's hand, Orion snapping to attention, eyes wide and pained. “Mother Box—she _screams—_ ”

“I know that, soldier. Do you know how to fix it?”

“I—” he stared blankly into space for a moment and then shook himself, and it seemed that something more human came back into his face. “I do. Mother Box will help me.” He shrank to roughly human scale and lifted himself into the air, flying over to where the Lexcorp building still stood, impossibly, in the middle of their impossible battlefield. The top of the building was open, Luthor's laboratory exposed to the sun, and the heroes on the field could see a table inside it, on which sat two large devices of clearly alien construction. Orion approached them cautiously, as one might approach a frightened child or a hurt animal, and when he spoke again his voice was soft but carried to every ear. “Mother Box, please close the boom tube.”

The hole in the sky closed with a vast cracking sound, and the now-inactive Parademon robots crumbled—

—and the impossible battlefield dissipated, and the heroes found themselves scattered across the globe, in pairs and groups, exhausted and reeling from the battle they had fought.

Carol Danvers let out a long breath, shielding her eyes from the blinding light of the sun coming up over Prague, while beside her Hal Jordan rolled his neck. “Is it over?”

It was over.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Up next: Aftermath! But good aftermath, mostly.


	12. Damage Control

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Our heroes pick up after themselves in the DCU, and Merlin finally returns home to his mothers.

When the heroes arrived back at the Watchtower they found their younger counterparts sitting on the floor in the middle of the command room, regaling Mr. Miracle with stories and laughing in a faintly strained way that smacked of exhaustion. Merlin was slumped against Raven's shoulder, looking a little green but still smiling.

As the adults trooped in Kate was snorting and ruffling his hair. “I _still_ can't believe you threw up, man. But anyway, that thing, where Cass pulled the head off that one robot...that was _awesome._ ”

Wonder Girl grinned. “Oh, I don't know. I think the best part was when Teddy picked one up and threw it into another one, and then Jaime blew them both up.”

“That _was_ pretty—” Merlin froze, the color draining from his face. “Oh. Um. Hi, Dad.”

Clint towered over them, arms folded over his chest, frowning. Undaunted, Mr. Miracle waved to him. “You must be Hawkeye. Quickdraw here's your son? He's a good kid.”

There was a long pause, and then Clint raised an eyebrow. “Quickdraw?”

Merlin went from deathly pale to bright red in a matter of seconds. “I didn't have a lot of time to think about it!”

Blue Beetle shrugged. “We _tried_ to come up with something better for him, but we couldn't decide in time.”

“And the _costume?_ ”

Billy grinned. “Kate designed it. With a lot of input.”

Another pause, and then Clint let out a long sigh. Merlin bit his lip nervously. “Am I in trouble? I'm in trouble, aren't I?”

“You might be. Give me a second.” Clint surveyed the group of them, his gaze finally settling on Kate. “Did he do ok?”

Kate nodded. “Yeah. For a rookie.”

Merlin looked down at his feet. “I threw up.”

Clint almost— _almost—_ smiled. “Well, so did I, first time I was in live combat.” He looked back at Merlin. “I think, wizard, that just this once I won't tell your mothers. Anyway, I like the costume. Very colorful. And Robin is in _way_ more trouble than you anyway. So introduce me to your friends.”

“Well, um, this is Mr. Miracle, he helped us out when the Watchtower got attacked...”

 

\--

 

The civilian casualty counts rolling in were surprisingly low, but the collateral damage was impressive—the Parademons had attacked buildings as well as people, and some had even devoted themselves to tearing up roadways and destroying vegetation. Wolverine was standing in close to one of the command room monitors, puffing away on a cigar despite the disapproving looks of the other heroes around him and looking over the surveillance footage of the major damage sights. He whistled low. “Y'know what I miss?”

The local heroes glanced at him, and after a moment Wildcat said, almost coaxingly, “No, Wolverine, what do you miss?”

“Damage Control. You guys need a branch of Damage Control here.”

Wildcat nodded slowly. “I'd say we could use some damage control, yeah. Kind of a mess out there. Branch, though?”

“Yeah. Official Avengers clean-up crew. Gotta deal with a lot of sass, but they get the job done. I'll see if I can hook you guys up.”

Orion had returned to the Watchtower with the other heroes. He hadn't tried to talk to anyone so far but for a brief stop to speak to, and thank, Captain America, and had retired to a corner of the command room, where he sat, looking worried and murmuring to his mother box.

Reed Richards began to approach him, raising one hand in clear preparation for launching into a speech, but was stilled by the sudden feeling of his wife's hand on his shoulder. He turned to frown at her. “Sue, what's wrong?”

She made a subtle gesture toward Orion with her chin. “You were going to go bug him about his travel in between universes. Don't. He's in pain. If you really want to bother someone, go talk to Clint's kid, I'm sure his moms have told him a ton.”

“But if I don't talk to him now then I may never get the chance again. How often to I get to talk to genuinely well-traveled interdimensional beings? This could be _priceless_ for future research.”

“ _I'll_ talk to him.” She smiled kindly, brushing a few loose hairs out of his face. “I know what you'd want to ask, and I can promise that right now, all excited like this, you'd just upset him.”

“But—”

“ _Later._ If he's feeling up to it. Go bother the kids; they'd love to tell someone about their big fight, and maybe you can talk one of them into babysitting Franklin once we're back to we can have a nice dinner to ourselves.”

Reed stared at her for a moment, clearly trying to work up some sort of response to this, and then nodded. “I suppose I _should_ go talk to Clint's boy while I have the chance. And the other young people, of course. Remind me which ones are from our universe, again?”

_“Go.”_

Once Reed had hurried off to bother the newly-formed and already absurdly close Young Titans, Sue grabbed an unused chair from the nearest console and pulled it over to Orion's corner, where she sat next to him. He looked up at her and nodded gravely. “I do not believe that we have been introduced.”

She held out a hand. “I'm Sue Richards.”

“I am Orion, of New Genesis.” He took her hand and bowed his head over it briefly. “You are from the other universe?”

“Mm-hm. You probably didn't see me during the battle, though.”

“No, I...” he paused, peering at her. “I did not see you. But Mother Box _sensed_ you. You were...invisible?”

“It's what I do.”

“I have a friend who can do something similar. And you saw me during the battle...and I do not frighten you?”

She shrugged. “Not especially. You should see my family. How is...Mother Box?”

He glanced down at his mother box with a kind of sorrowful good humor. “She is better. She was not as affected as some of the others, which were in closer proximity to that... _creature's_ abuse. The other boxes, the other parts of her...they will recover in time. They mourn. _She_ mourns.”

Orion drifted off, staring into space tensely, and Sue moved her chair closer to his and reached over to lay a comforting hand on his back. “But they'll recover. That's the important thing. They can come back from it.”

“They can.”

“And what about the incidents, with the travel between worlds? Are the boom tubes going to stop now?”

“They _should._ But...the day has been saved, but the damage is irreversible.” Orion frowned, tilting his head toward his mother box again. “Mother Box tells me that the barriers between the worlds have been permanently weakened. We may return the travelers to their homes, but there is no guarantee that crossings will cease. They just won't happen with such violence.”

“Hm.” She smiled. “Honestly, I think my husband's going to be _thrilled_ to hear that.”

“Your husband?”

“Over there. The excitable one.” Reed was sitting with the young heroes and Mr. Miracle, talking rapidly and at length about something Sue couldn't hear. “He's a physicist, mostly. I had to shoo him off, or else he'd be doing that at _you._ He gets very enthusiastic about interdimensional travel.”

Orion watched for a moment as Reed stretched out both arms to get the attention of a few of the other scientists, and after a moment he smiled faintly. “He seems...joyful. So at least someone is gaining good from this situation. Do you assist him in his research?”

“What, me?” She laughed. “No, I like something with more of a practical application. I'm interdisciplinary, archaeology and marine biology.” At his puzzled look, she elaborated, “I like the ocean, and I'm trying to find Atlantis. Childhood dream.”

His smile grew. He actually laughed a little. “That's a practical application?”

She grinned. “It has its uses. So, tell me about New Genesis before we all get hauled out again for clean-up.”

 

\--

 

Clean-up, in the end, consisted mainly of Oracle locating all the still-living boomers and transmitting their coordinates to the Watchtower, where they could be assigned to teams of heroes for collection. Most, when found, were thrilled to learn that they would be going back to their home universes—the key word being, of course, _most._ Hawkman and Luke Cage had particular difficulty with one, a green man with a yellow zoot suit and a frustrating attitude, who in the end had to be knocked out and carried back to the satellite by Guy Gardner.

The crown jewel of the boomer finds turned out to be in the wilds of northern Canada, wandering towards the North Pole with a massive sword strapped to his back. When hailed by the Canada team he turned and shouted to them in a language that none of them understood, and Beast stared. “Oh. Oh, my. I think it's...is that...?”

“Is that _Aragorn?_ ” Animal Man landed next to him, bug-eyed. “I _auditioned_ for the Lord of the Rings movies. I _love_ those books.”

Wolverine snorted. “If you two dweebs are done with your orgasms...” He cracked his neck and then shouted something back at the man with the sword, in a language made of sibilants and ellisions. The man with the sword nodded and responded in kind, and then walked over to join them. “Ok, we're good, let's go.”

Animal Man's eyes had bugged out even more, to the point where Beast began to suspect that he was actually channeling some variety of insect powers. “Wolverine, was that—”

“Moving on. Back to the space station or whatever.”

“Logan.” Beast put a hand over his heart. “This is a side of you we've never seen before.”

Wolverine began trudging away, the sword-carrying man in tow. “Yeah, well, they're long books. Gives ya something to do when yer squad mates are morons. You know how dull it got sometimes in Korea?”

Orion's lightsaber was found in the Urals by Moon Knight and Huntress and immediately became the subject of a furious war between engineers, which ceased when they realized that if they all banded together, they could reverse-engineer it that much quicker.

And then it was time to go home.

 

\--

 

“Go change, wizard. If I bring you home in a costume Shelly will gut me. And then I'm pretty sure Carol will _take_ my guts and make them into curtain cords.”

Merlin scowled. He was already ill-tempered after having been separated from his new friends, and was far too pleased with his new costume (and superhero name!) to want to take them off so soon. So he stalled. “What am I supposed to wear, then? My clothes were on the—”

“—Watchtower, where you conveniently left them in the hopes of doing something that would upset your mothers.” Steve clapped him on the shoulder, smiling, and handed him a bag. “Your friend Batgirl gave me these just as I was leaving. Go change, Merlin.”

“Kid, I respect your dedication to a potential future career, but I'm siding with Clint and Steve here. If we send you home in a costume after you've been missing for a week and a half Shelly will find us and roast us over a slow fire.” Tony grinned. “You do apparently bring out her stabby side.” His phone rang then, and he snatched it up. “Heya, Summers. Yeah, we're back. ...what do you _mean,_ you fought Galactus?”

If it had been anyone else Merlin might have continued to argue, but facing with the opposition of a room full of superheroes was a little too much even for him. Sighing, he slung the bag of clothes over his shoulder and adjourned to the laboratory bathroom to change. His new costume got packed away, and although he never would have admitted it, it was really a relief to pull on well-worn jeans, Batman t-shirt, and familiar purple hoodie in preparation for going _home._ At least he'd gotten most of his other things back, although his wallet and cell phone had apparently been lost forever somewhere in Gotham City.

When he got back out to the main lab, Reed had already started up the old gate, the one that anchored at his house, and Clint was on the phone, a faraway look in his eyes. “Yeah...I know it's late, and I'm _really_ sorry about the gap in communications there. Yeah, we'll be there in a few minutes. He's fine...seriously, I promise, he did ok for himself. ...see ya, Shel.” He hung up the phone and tucked it into his pocket.

Merlin stared at the gate in some consternation. “...I'm never going to see any of these people again, am I?”

Clint shrugged, and then pulled him into a hug. “Who knows? You might. Apparently everything's _fucked_ now, dimensionally speaking, so you could run into them again. And anyway, maybe I'll grab you for a visit sometime, now that I know you probably won't just get yourself killed right off.”

Reed waved. “It was nice meeting you, Merlin. You should hurry; the gate's playing up a bit.”

They nodded, Merlin waved back, and together he and Clint ducked through the gate and into the living room of his house.

The first thing Merlin heard on the other side was a loud shriek, and then right after that the first thing he felt was the impact of one of his mothers rushing in to hug him. His face was suddenly full of red curls, and he patted his mother's back awkwardly, feeling mildly embarassed. “Hi, Mom.”

Shelly squeezed him tightly. “Oh, Merlin, I was so _worried..._ ”

After a second Carol managed to nudge Shelly aside to get in a hug of her own, getting up on her toes to kiss him on the cheek. “Hey there, little bird. Where did you get to? You scared the _shit_ out of us.”

Her tone was light, but when he looked down he could see that her face was white and pinched, and he suddenly slumped into her embrace, feeling enormously relieved. “I got lost.”

“I _heard._ Anything exciting happen?”

There were plenty of things he could have said, plenty of cool things that _wouldn't_ have been awkward at all, but Merlin found that besides being relieved he was also very tired, and so he said the first thing that came to mind, which was, “I kissed Catman.”

Then he winced as he saw his mother put two plus two together and come up with the Secret Six. Her eyes went wide. “You _what?_ ”

Shelly blinked. “Catman's the dishy one, right? With the eggs, and the casual nudity?”

“You got kidnapped by _supervillains?_ ” Carol whirled on Clint. “You let him get _kidnapped_ by _supervillains?_ ”

Clint backed away, raising his hands in a futile warding gesture. “Hey, I didn't let him do _anything._ He got kidnapped all by himself.”

“Yeah, it was seriously like the second thing that happened.”

“You... _you..._ ” Carol threw up her hands. “I don't know what I'm going to do with you, Merlin.”

“Then I shot him in the face with a pencil. And I met the Riddler. And the Joker almost killed me and then Superman saved me because I _called_ him, and there was a robot Lex Luthor, and—” Shelly was the one to go pale now, and Merlin was suddenly embarrassed to see that both of his mothers had white hairs that he didn't remember them having had before he'd left. He moved over to sit on the couch, sighing shakily. “And a lot of it was really shitty and I was scared and I wished you were there because you always know what to do.”

His mothers came and sat on either side of him, still tense, and Clint looked at them together on the couch and moved to colonize an armchair facing them. “How have things been here? Still a media circus?”

Merlin glanced over at him, startled. “Shit, right. The Olympics, and the interviews, and then I disappeared...what's happened?”

“Like Clint said.” Carol sighed. “A media circus. 'Olympic gold medalist mysteriously disappears.' We've got government people in town looking for you—they're going to help us come up with a cover story for where you were. They got in touch with us as soon as we contacted the police.”

Shelly giggled faintly. “Yeah, apparently we're on some kind of secret list? For people who've been involved in interdimensional travel incidents? So we have a _secret agent_ now. He's actually staying in one of the guest rooms, but he went to the store to get milk. He's nice, you'll like him. Did you get to meet Agent Coulson?”

Clint shook his head. “Coulson's on vacation right now, and we didn't want to interrupt it.”

Finally Carol thought to take Merlin's things and move them to the side—she helped him take off his quiver and put it on the coffee table, and then took his bag and glanced inside, apparently surprised at its weight. Her eyes went wide, and then narrowed, and a flush began to rise in her cheeks. When she spoke, her voice was low and dangerous. “Merlin, is that a costume?”

He blanched. “Um...yes?”

“Clint, did you let him fight?”

“Let nothing! The kids put him in that suit when I wasn't around! I told him he _wasn't_ allowed to have a costume!”

Shelly grabbed the bag from Carol and looked inside. “Young man, you are in _so much trouble_ right now, I can't even put it in words.”

“Hey, it seemed like the right thing to do at the time! And Kate designed it for me so you can't take it away.”

“So, uh...” Clint swallowed hard, clearly hoping to defuse the situation. “I'm going to wait for your agent to get back, because I have some news that he's probably going to want to hear too, about interdimensional travel stuff.”

Carol shook her head. “Young man, you are _grounded_ until you grow a sense of _self-preservation._ And...wait. Kate made this for you? Kate _Bishop_? Clint's junior partner?”

“Yeah.” Merlin sighed, staring off into space. “She's awesome. She likes shooting bows just as much as I do. Maybe more.” 

All three of his parents stared at him.

But they were staring at him at _home._ So that was ok.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Up next: An epilogue, as usual! Because I love epilogues! ^_^


	13. Epilogue: Thin Walls

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And thus dawned a new era of cooperation between universes!

“Good afternoon, Avengers! Emergency Helpline call!” the voice of one of the Avengers Emergency Helpline operators trilled over the comms. “There is an AIM strike team in Tribeca. I repeat, there are beekeepers in Tribeca, please respond.”

“Thanks, Moira. Wasp is on it.” Janet van Dyne veered toward the source of the disturbance, adjusting her headpiece. “Nearest patrolling Avengers, assemble.” Several other Avengers chimed in with affirmatives, and she grinned. “Hey, new guy, you on this?”

“I'm on it!”

In the middle of Seventh Avenue, the group of AIM scientists who were currently holding up traffic with their truck-mounted Wide-Range Singularity Rocket were shocked to find themselves abruptly scattered by a red blur. Whatever the blur was, it had the wheels off their truck in no time, and none of them could get back to the console of the rocket to fire it without being pushed back. One scientist began to swear, adjusting the faceplate of his helmet as if that might help him see what was attacking them. “What the non-Euclidean _fuck...?_ Is that _Quicksilver?_ Did he change costumes?”

“Close but no cigar!” The blur suddenly stopped, on the top of their rocket, vibrating lines solidifying into a grinning masked man in a red bodysuit with a lightning bolt in yellow on the chest. “Hi, kids, I'm the Flash! I'm like Quicksilver, but slightly faster and less of a dick.”

They gaped at him, and the scientist who had spoken before stammered out, “Then where's Quicksilver?”

“Shiny new superhero exchange program. He's far, far away. So hey, what does this button do?”

“No, don't press that!”

Meanwhile, in Central City, Mirror Master went flying across the street and into a mailbox. He curled over reflexively, attempting to protect his groin, and stared up at the green-and-white figure approaching him. “You actually _punched_ me! In the groin! At high velocity! The Flash never does that! Who _are_ you?”

Pietro Maximoff smirked. “Exchange program, dear boy. Think of me as Central City's new touch of class.”

 

THE END? (Hint: Not even a little!)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok, so! This story was for some reason an absolute _bitch_ to write. If you enjoyed it, awesome--please let me know! ^_^ If you want more, keep an eye out both here and on [my Tumblr](http://dangerouscommiesubversive.tumblr.com/)\--the Tumblr will, sometime real soon, be getting a few "deleted scenes" from this story (i.e. I wanted to write about these two people meeting up but couldn't make it fit). If there's a crossover meeting you'd love to see, drop me an ask!


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